


You're the one I wanna go through time with

by notapartytrick



Series: The Room Where It Happens [2]
Category: Iron Man (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, Room (2015), Spider-Man (Tom Holland Movies)
Genre: Adult Peter Parker, College Student Peter Parker, Couch Cuddles, Dogs, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Flashbacks, Gay Harley Keener, Good Parent Peter Parker, Harley Keener Needs a Hug, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Mental Health Issues, Multi, Past Rape/Non-con, Peter Parker Angst, Peter Parker Needs a Hug, Peter Parker has a dog!, Protective Harley Keener, Psychological Trauma, Recovery, Teen Peter Parker, Tony Stark Acting as Peter Parker's Parental Figure, Tony Stark Has A Heart
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-15
Updated: 2021-02-05
Packaged: 2021-03-13 10:49:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 4
Words: 25,783
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28777071
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/notapartytrick/pseuds/notapartytrick
Summary: Blinking awake to a soft nudging at his chin, Peter can’t quite tell where he is for a moment.He’s used to being jerked awake by the click of the Room’s door opening or invading hands where they shouldn’t be or, at best, Tony’s roughened call of “morning, kid.” This gentle touch is none of these things.Light seeps past his eyelids, real light, sunlight from underneath his curtains in his room - and then a flash of white fur.He searches blearily for the source of the fluff. It melts like cotton candy beneath his fingers. The nudging is coming from a black button nose.“Kobol.”It still feels like a dream that the bundle of fluff in his arms is his dog. Every inch of him is overwhelmed by affection for Kobol, his tiny, floppy ears, his bright eyes, his dainty paws, the translucent set of whiskers that frame his snout.His dog.*   *   *On the 20th of October 2020, Kobol became Peter Parker's dog. This is the story of their friendship through the years. After all, dogs are man's best friend.
Relationships: Harley Keener/Peter Parker, Michelle Jones/Peter Parker, Peter Parker & Original Character(s), Peter Parker & Tony Stark
Series: The Room Where It Happens [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2109738
Comments: 139
Kudos: 132





	1. More than getting by

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ***This fic contains references to past sexual abuse and depictions of characters in unhealthy mental states. Stay safe everyone!***  
> Here, at last, is the beginning of the wider Room Where It Happens series!! This work tracks the life of Kobol and his impact on Peter over a long period of time as he tries to find his new place in the world. I chose this short, choppy format to match the style of the original work and to suit the long-haul timeline of this thing. I'm aware that this additional stuff is unlikely to be super popular, but I thought I'd post it anyway as a labour of love and an exploration of a lot of themes close to my heart which I hope you will enjoy reading, however many of you there are :)  
> Before reading this work, I'd strongly suggest reading the original work - The Room Where It Happens - to get a sense of the place these characters are in and why Peter Parker has a dog in this?? and a buttload of trauma???
> 
> Title from 'Time in a bottle' by Jim Croce/Yungblud (yes it's the song used in the cherry trailer. yes i've been listening to that song and screaming for many hours. judge me if you dare)  
> Working title: 'No, sir, that's my emotional support floof'

_21st October 2020_

Blinking awake to a soft nudging at his chin, Peter can’t quite tell where he is for a moment.

He’s used to being jerked awake by the _click_ of the Room’s door opening or invading hands where they shouldn’t be or, at best, Tony’s roughened call of “morning, kid.” This gentle touch is none of these things.

Light seeps past his eyelids, real light, sunlight from underneath his curtains in his room - and then a flash of white fur.

He searches blearily for the source of the fluff. It melts like cotton candy beneath his fingers. The nudging is coming from a black button nose.

“Kobol.”

It still feels like a dream that the bundle of fluff in his arms is _his dog._ Every inch of him is overwhelmed by affection for Kobol, his tiny, floppy ears, his bright eyes, his dainty paws, the translucent set of whiskers that frame his snout.

_His dog._

Put at rest by the familiarity of his bedroom and the new satisfaction of Kobol at his side, Peter plants a kiss to the tender fur on the crown of his puppy’s head then lets his eyes drift shut again.

Downstairs, Tony and Pepper sit at breakfast wearing matching grins.

Tony drops his toast slice and huffs triumphantly. “Told you the puppy would work wonders.”

“Did I ever doubt you on that?” Pepper returns.

“This has got to be the first time he’s slept in since we got out of hospital. I think we’ve successfully converted him to proper teenagedom.”

Pepper lifts Tony’s hand from where it lays across the table and presses a kiss to it with upturned lips.

“Superdad,” she whispers as she walks by him to load her plate into the dishwasher.

“What was that?”

“What? I didn’t say anything.”

“You definitely did.”

“I was clearing my throat.”

* * *

_22nd October_

“Dog bed, puppy food, blanket, food and water bowls, collar, harness, rope lead, _extendable_ lead, travelling crate, grooming brush, poop bags, dog shampoo, a million different toys… and that should be it.” 

“Think we have enough?” jokes Peter, eyeing the mountain of items they’ve just dumped on the living room floor. Kobol goes straight to investigate them. Predictably, he pushes past a piled-up rope lead to sniff at the bag of treats behind it. 

Flopping to the floor cross-legged, Peter sets his elbows on his knees, his chin in his hands, and, while watching the puppy’s enthusiastically fluttering tail, deflates before Tony’s eyes.

Tony sits down beside him. The pile of equipment almost reaches his shoulder. 

“What is it?”

“I… I don’t know. I guess I just - I always thought I’d have a friend to do this with me. Someone I could show him off to or something. I know that’s pretty dumb.”

“It’s not.” 

Tony’s compelled to brighten the kid up again. He plucks the rope lead from the pile with a flourish and waves it in front of Kobol, who immediately leaps after it, his front paws flailing. “Why not show him off now?”

“He hasn’t gotten his second set of vaccinations yet.”

“Not to the neighbourhood. Just to our house. Our yard. Our... world.”

And it is their world now. They get to shape it themselves.

With the puppy cradled in his arms, Tony lets Peter clip on the periwinkle collar he’d picked out and attach the rope lead to it. “Look at you, baby,” coos the kid. “Aren’t you handsome?”

Tony sets him on the ground, allowing him to paw and sniff at the lead until he stops treating it like some kind of threatening alien object. 

Peter reaches for the loop handle and gently tugs him forward. It takes a lot of encouragement from the kid and a few nudges from Tony to his back legs, but eventually the dog gets the idea and shoots forwards in a blur of clumsy paws and inquisitive looks and furry limbs. All Tony does in the end is watch from the corner of the garden as Peter leads the dog around in haphazard circles. Well, Peter’s smiling, and Tony finds he is too.

* * *

_24th October_

Peter’s patience is running out.

The guy in the YouTube video had done everything so effortlessly and calmly. Peter thinks that video gave him too much confidence. That confidence is definitely starting to run out on him now as he pinches the treat Kobol is scrabbling after between thumb and forefinger and tries once again to wave it in the right direction to get him to sit down.

“Please, baby, get the idea. Sit.”

Kobol bats at his fingers with his paws, standing on his hind legs.

“That is the opposite of sitting.”

With a sigh, he puts away the treat and looks down at his beautiful, dumb dog.

“Look, baby boy, let’s try and work together. You want the treat, I want you to sit. We can do both of those things, yeah? Just--”

Kobol immediately drops into a sitting position.

“What? Y _es!_ How did you _know_? Good boy! Tony, come and see, he’s doing it!”

  
* * *

_25th October_

“I know. It probably looks pretty weird, right?” Peter remarks to Kobol as the puppy wrestles with a grooming brush half his size. “Yeah. Bite it if you want. I’m hoping that I can brush you with it in a minute, if that’s alright with you.”

A fond smirk spreads across Tony’s face as he watches the pair. Kobol has set free a whole new part of Peter that’s relaxed and amused and witty and caring all at once. Seeing him like that sets off a glow in Tony’s chest that’s ridiculously mushy. He doesn’t care.

The puppy clambers up into Peter’s lap and upturns his nose to touch the kid’s chin.

“Is that a kiss? That’s _adorable._ Thank you, baby.” Peter drops a kiss over his ear in response. “Let’s get down to business. I’m just gonna put this over your fur here - yeah, like that. And then take it off. That wasn’t so bad, huh?”

There’s an answering yap from the dog.

“Okay - try and sit still, baby - time for a little stroke.”

He begins to brush through Kobol’s delicate coat, but the dog skitters away almost instantly.

“So you’re gonna have me running around after you now?”

Peter begins to shuffle over to where Kobol is darting away, but - Tony swears he can make out mischief glinting in his eyes - the dog only widens the gap between them.

“Come on,” Peter groans. “We were _bonding.”_

Tony can’t stifle his laugh. 

* * *

_2nd December_

Peter can’t stop shivering.

The numbers on his clock are blurred. He can’t piece together what they mean. Pulling his covers further around him, he forces a swallow through his throat and resolves to sleep it off.

His eyes flutter but won’t shut.

It’s only when he attempts to sit up in bed that he begins to panic. The shivering is so violent, his thoughts so foggy, that he can barely lift his head. He’s made of fire and ice, burning and freezing all at once. The room is spinning. His very veins ache.

A soft nudge to his forearm reminds him of Kobol’s presence beside him.

“Go and get Tony and Pepper,” he breathes, nudging back with all the coordination he can muster. “Go on, baby boy.”

Kobol, somehow always aware of what he has to do, butts his forehead lovingly against Peter’s, then noses open the door and pads away.

Time blends and blurs, grey in the dark of night, and Peter shivers and shivers and shivers and prays for it to end. Then a cool hand on his burning, freezing forehead pulls him from his stupor.

“Hey, kid,” comes the voice he knows better than any other. “K called ahead. He’s a smart one, isn’t he?”

Peter tries to nod but the motion is lost in a fit of shaking.

“Okay. Okay. You’re gonna be fine. How are you feeling? It wasn’t a nightmare, was it?”

“No. I’m just cold, and hot, and - I - I can’t stop shivering.”

“Yeah, you’re burning up.”

“Cold.”

A hand rests over his arm and runs up and down rhythmically, dispelling just a little of the cold, and although the touch feels red-hot Peter prefers it to the loneliness of night. He exhales.

“I’m gonna go downstairs in a second and fetch some stuff, but you’ll have your personal panic button--” 

At that moment, Kobol runs back into the room and tangles himself back around Peter.

“Right on cue. Okay? You’re good for now?”

“Good for now,” Peter returns in a whisper.

Brushing a kiss against Peter’s nose and a hand through his hair, Tony turns to leave with visible reluctance.

Kobol’s fur is soothing and gently warm against Peter’s chest. Peter dips his head to meet the dog’s and murmurs, “Thanks, boy.” 

* * *

_13th March 2021_

A paw bats at his arm.

“Not now.”

Again. _Fgfewf_ is typed on his laptop keyboard, undermining the almost-finished World History essay he’s got to submit for online class in the next five minutes.

“Baby.”

_Paw._

“One more minute and I’ll pet you.”

_Bark!_

“ _Kobol._ ”

_Paw._

“Tony! Can you get him a treat or something?” he hollers up the stairs. 

For a minute, he’s scared he’s forgotten himself. In his head, Larry hisses, _“Shut up.”_

“I’m elbow-deep in a new patent, kid!”

“Literally - just for five minutes, I have five minutes of World History then I’ll take him out!”

“Okay, hold on, I’m wrapping something up, then I’ll be there.”

_Bark!_

Peter shoots Kobol a look. “Unless you know anything about the creation of the Constitution, I don’t wanna hear it.”

Tony saves him just thirty seconds later, entering the room with Bear in his hands. It’s one of the few toys Kobol hasn’t ripped to shreds within minutes. It turns out that his desire to dig and bite often overwhelms his obedient innocence at playtime, which has led to the destruction of a _lot_ of toys. He treats Bear, however, with the utmost care, nuzzling her tenderly, carrying her about in his mouth and sometimes giving her to other people when he thinks they need comforting. 

Peter snorts as Kobol rushes to Tony in an instant and stares adoringly up at Bear. “You’re a lifesaver.”

“Stay in school,” deadpans Tony.

He arrives back in the room after he’s tossed Bear into the kitchen, bracing his arms against Peter’s desk. “Did you know you can sign him up as an emotional support dog?”

“An…” Peter can’t help but pull a face. “Is that, like, a real thing?”

“A real thing?”

“I feel like people only say that to joke about it,” he admits.

“No. It’s not a joke.” Lowering himself into a crouch, forearms resting across the surface of the desk, Tony nudges Peter’s hand with his own. “It’s official documentation, and it could help you.”

“But people - what if people still think it’s just a joke?”

Tony becomes deadly serious. “Anyone tells you it’s a joke, they lose their teeth.”

Losing himself to a laugh, Peter sits back in his desk chair, studying the smooth ceiling for a moment, thinking, just briefly, of the thick soundproofing it had in the Room.

_They screamed and screamed and screamed for help but knew nobody would hear them--_

“That’s not realistic,” he says eventually.

Tony still seeks his gaze. “Don’t think about _people_ . Think about _you._ ”

“But I can’t just think about me, you know?” Peter returns with an unintended bite. “It’s not as simple as just me.”

“Peter, just--” 

Peter flinches. It had been just slightly too loud, too harsh.

Dropping his head to his chest, Tony breathes out a sigh. Peter feels awful all at once.

“Think on it,” Tony adds with a plastered-on smile.

Peter rushes to amend. “I will.” 

* * *

“Baby, how would you feel about being my emotional support animal?”

Kobol, curled up on his stomach where he lies on the couch, eyes him attentively. Peter likes to pretend he understands every word that’s spoken to him.

“Would that be good? Or would it be weird?”

The response is a nuzzling into Peter’s t-shirt and a snore. Ambiguous.

Scratching lightly at the fluff between Kobol’s ears, Peter says the first thing that comes into his head: “That felt like a yes.”

Somehow, it’s enough to sway him.

* * *

_29th April_

“So - just to lay it out a final time for you, Peter - this ESA letter serves as official documentation which grants Kobol the status of an emotional support animal. As the owner of an emotional support animal, you will be afforded certain protections under federal law that will allow you to live with Kobol even in no-pet buildings and have him accompany you to places unregistered animals would not be permitted to enter. I am your licensed therapist, and by signing this documentation I am allowing Kobol to become your emotional support dog.”  
Peter’s leg bounces rhythmically, not with nerves but with excitement. 

“Okay. Okay, cool.”

“Here you are,” says his therapist, passing him the letter from across the coffee table between them. She smiles down at the puppy sprawled across his feet. “Kobol, you’ve got the job.”

The letter in his hands sends an almost unexplainable thrill through him. He supposes it’s a piece of paper-printed validation of Kobol’s ability to keep him afloat.

“Thank you, Amy,” he beams. “This is - this is awesome.”

“You’re very welcome. There was no doubt in my mind that you would both benefit from having that documentation.”

Peter reaches for Kobol, bundles his white-haired limbs into his arms, and buries his face in the forest of his fur.

* * *

_9th September_

There are pros and cons to owning a Samoyed. Swept up in the elation of the puppies roaming the living room back in 2020, Peter hadn’t noticed the white hairs parting from fluffy coats and latching onto his clothes, but he sure notices them now.

It’s his first day at senior year - his first day of high school too because he’d missed out on the rest of it stuck in the Room then catching up online - and he just wanted to wear a really nice sweater, but of course he’d forgotten to hang it up and it’s received what Tony likes to call _the Kobol treatment,_ by which he means that there is hair _all over it._ Hardly a square inch of the fabric is clean. Kobol must have nested in it.

The dog comes running to him as he groans in frustration, sensing his distress and making an innocent attempt to assuage it.

“Look what you’ve _done,_ K.”

The sudden ducking of Kobol’s head halts his irritation in an instant.

“Hey, I’m sorry. I’m not mad at you, I’m just… scared, I think.”

Peter strokes Kobol absent-mindedly. He’s suddenly reluctant to leave the sanctuary of his room. He darts his gaze back and forth half in a habitual motion and half to search unconsciously for shadows that aren’t there.

“Do you think anyone’s gonna want to be friends with me?” he whispers to Kobol. “I just… you know, I wanna have friends I can graduate with and turn eighteen with and walk to class with and talk with about normal stuff. But I missed four years of normal stuff, and what if everyone can tell?”

Kobol just flops to the floor, panting blissfully at the attention he’s being given.

“Got any ideas about what I should wear now?”

More panting.

“Yeah, didn’t think so.”

Picking himself up decisively from the floor, Peter rifles through his closet for something hair-free. The only good sweater he can find is low-necked and sends a sting of anxiety through him.

He tries it on and assesses himself in the mirror. There’s still the residue of an angry purple bruise on the side of his neck, a bruise that hasn’t disappeared even after a year, a bruise that any high school kid would most definitely be able to identify as a hickey. 

“Crap,” he whispers, resting his forehead heavily on the cool surface of the mirror.

Dabbing a layer of concealer over the area only takes five minutes out of his morning routine, but it still feels like too long. He takes one last look at himself - wearing the new sweater and a shirt, a slight discolouration on his neck, the crease in his brow, his stupid always-fluffy hair - and prays that at _least_ the makeup doesn’t rub off.

“Alright. Let’s do this. High school.”

Kobol trails at his heels as he goes downstairs as if he knows today will change things for good.

* * *

Before he leaves for school, he drops to his knees before his dog and wraps his arms around him, trying to draw strength from the familiar coat of warm fur that envelops him.

Tony and Pepper told the school a little about Peter’s past, but he’s drawn the line at bringing in a support dog. Legally, he can have Kobol, but he wants to fit in. He wants to be normal. An emotional support dog won’t make him be popular. So no Kobol, and no overly concerned teachers, and no in-school therapist, and no personal teaching assistant. 

Well, he doesn’t think he’ll be too popular, joining in senior year with basically no knowledge of how to interact with other kids, but...

“I’ll only be away for seven hours and twenty-four minutes, okay, baby? Maybe thirty minutes if there’s traffic, ten if there isn’t any. I know that sounds pretty long, but, uh - it won’t seem so long. I have homeroom, then first, second and third period, then a ten minute break where I’m gonna… try and make some friends or something, I guess? And then fourth and fifth period, then a thirty minute lunch break where hopefully I’ll have a friend to sit with, then sixth, seventh, and then it’s about a seventeen-minute drive home after the day ends at 2:17 pm and I’ll be back here. That doesn’t sound so long, right?”

“Kid,” Tony says, overly soft like he might break Peter if he spoke too harshly. “Time to go.”

The breath Peter forces in and out of his chest is much less confident than he would have liked.

Peter lets go of Kobol. He stands. He gets his backpack on. He turns towards the front drive and walks out with Tony.

The moment they close the door, a chorus of mournful howls starts up just behind it. It twists at Peter’s heart. All of a sudden, he’s really not sure if this is a good idea.

_But this is your chance to get back to normal. If you can’t do this now, maybe you never will._

_I’m gonna find a friend,_ he thinks staunchly. He repeats it. _I’m gonna find a friend._

Tony sets a hand on his shoulder and steers him gently towards the car, leaving him room to shy away if he wants to, as if he’s handling a feral animal. 

The last thing he hears before the car door slams shut is a last, pitiful cry.

Tony studies him while he does up his seatbelt. “You’re not feeling really bad, are you? Because we don’t have to do this. We can stop right now and stay at home and you can finish high school online.”

“No, I’m fine. I’m gonna be good.”

* * *

Kobol hears Peter arrive only six hours later. Tony had picked up a call at midday, nudged him aside, and headed straight for the door, fumbling with car keys and two jackets and still muttering into the phone he’d mashed between his shoulder and cheek. Kobol was alone again for a while. Now, Peter and Tony are back, but something’s wrong.

Peter leans into Tony’s steering arm as he’s led into the house. He looks exhausted, harrowed, boneless. Kobol wonders if wherever he went made him shrink.

But one thing he knows is this: when Peter is scared, it’s a time for quiet.

Peter wanders into the living room, stops right in the centre, sheds his backpack, then curls up wordlessly on the carpet.

Kobol nudges his way into his arms; Peter buries his face in his coat. Ragged breaths gust through Kobol’s fur.

A series of clicks and creaks herald Tony's reappearance. He sits by Peter’s head, beginning to run a hand gently through his hair, wrapping Peter’s fragility in a soft shell of protection.

“I’m sorry it didn’t go the way you wanted,” he murmurs to the nape of Peter’s neck.

A small shrug lifts the fabric of Peter’s second-favourite sweater.

“We can change things. We can make it easier. Get a buddy system, a personal education plan - maybe we could think again about you having Kobol around. You can definitely get exempted from sex ed from now on.”

There’s no reply.

“I’m sorry, Pete. I should have checked, I should have been more prepared. I know you were really close to getting through the day. Let it be known that I’m ridiculously proud of you for everything you _did_ get through.”

Tony opens his mouth to continue but finds no words at his disposal.

Eventually, Peter lifts his face just slightly from Kobol’s fur and murmurs, “Everyone saw it happen. My whole class. They laughed at me.”

He doesn’t look back at Tony, but if he did he might wonder if Tony was about to either yell or cry. Maybe both. But he doesn’t. He hardens his face and simply continues to weave his hands through Peter’s hair. 

Three solemn figures fill the house with quiet.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> if you're not sure what to comment but you want to say something, talk about your favourite moment/feature of the cherry trailer! i'll appreciate your comment all the same and i'm always up for screaming about WHAT A GOOD MOVIE THIS IS GONNA BE  
> hope you're all enjoying the story so far and having decent weeks!! It's hard time but there are always lessons to be learned and good to be found :) I've been fasting and praying recently - safely and healthily of course! - and it's just made me feel so much more in control of myself?? i've had issues with binging for a long time but i finally feel empowered to fight the urges. hoping it continues!!!


	2. In small ways

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yo lads, it me! back at it again with this work that's half in my old, over-descriptive style from last year, half in my new edgy style, and smoothed over by twenty minutes of half-hearted editing!!!  
> Enjoy this gradual descent into more and more angst heheheeh  
> The photos are reminders of how Kobol looks at that point in the story! He's a big boi now :,)

_ _

_ Night _

When Peter wears a smile, Kobol jumps and plays and smiles back. When he is quiet, Kobol is quiet too. When his hands shake, Kobol climbs under them and lets Peter stroke him until the tremors dissipate in the thickness of his fur. He just does. He likes to help Peter most of all.

And when Peter is the way he is now, when he shakes and jerks in his sleep, when the night is still and yet he is restless, Kobol knows to wake him up. He just does.

It takes a lot of nudging on his part and muffled sobs on Peter’s, but his reward is the wide, panicked pools of Peter’s eyes as they fly open and he startles awake.

“What?” he gasps.

Kobol watches him, waiting for him to find himself. His eyes are slowly clearing.

“Oh.”

Falling back against his pillows, he presses a hand against his quavering sternum, blows out a breath torn to shreds by dark memories. “God. Good boy, Kobol.”

In response, Kobol flops onto his belly at Peter’s side and sets his chin over his chest. Peter smiles weakly at the gesture.

“That was the weirdest thing. I was stuck in class and  _ he _ was there and… you know what, forget it. Don’t wanna think about it.”

He gets up. Peeling off his damp pyjama shirt, he searches in the dark for a new one, then whispers for Kobol to follow him as he creeps out of his room and down the stairs.

“Hey, it’s your first midnight walk,” he says to Kobol as he clips on his harness.

The front door swings open, thrusting a current of cold night air towards the boy and his dog, and they both shiver in its hold. Kobol gets a sense that what they’re doing is against some kind of rule, but all the anxiety he can feel on Peter is left over from his nightmare, not surrounding this nighttime trip. He trusts Peter.

They walk.

For a while, they run, Peter breaking into a jog, then a sprint, Kobol happy to follow him. Peter’s breaths punch fast and hard from his chest. It sounds like he’s getting as much oxygen in as possible from the suburban air around him, like he’s trying to churn out the bad air of turbulent sleep and drag in something cleaner. 

Then he stops. He puts his hands on his knees and gasps. Kobol jumps up against him and licks his face, hoping it will make him smile, and it does.

“Alright, K,” Peter says, petting him absentmindedly, “Let’s go home.”

* * *

_ 18th September _

An exclamation of “Hey, baby boy!” reaches Kobol as Peter and Tony enter the hallway after leaving for school seven hours ago. The delight in Peter’s tone is unexpected but perks up Kobol’s ears instantly.

He skitters over to where Peter has hung up his coat and backpack and leaps up, paws resting on Peter’s stomach.

“Hello! Do you wanna hear something cool?”   


It feels like an occasion to bark, so he does so.

Rubbing enthusiastically at the aura of fur around Kobol’s neck, Peter beams. “They want me for the Academic Decathlon team! I’m gonna be in a  _ team! _ ”

Tony squeezes his shoulder as he walks past then moves to grab the harness and lead from their hooks. A walk! Kobol hums with excitement.

He cranes his neck to reach up to Peter’s face, proceeding to smother it with his own kisses.

“And,” laughs Peter between licks, “You know -  _ ugh, right over my mouth, K  _ \- do you know what else? I made an -  _ ugh _ \- I made a friend! I did! And she’s called Rachel, and she takes pottery class and makes these gorgeous designs and she’s in the same lunch period and also my Gym class and--”

“Kid, you can keep gushing while we walk him.”   


“Oh, yeah. Wanna go on a walk now, baby?”

A walk! 

“Of course you do. Will there ever be a day where you don’t?”   


“I’d like to see that day,” Tony chips in, feigning exhaustion.

Peter hesitates. “I… don’t think I would.”

“Alright, don’t go getting all morbid on a good day.”

Peter snorts and goes to clip on Kobol’s lead. Yes! 

And Tony and Peter take him on a walk, and Peter grins through the whole journey, and Kobol is happy. 

* * *

_ 22nd November _

“Oh, Christ,” remarks Tony mildly as he rubs Peter’s trembling back through his seventh round of vomiting in the last half an hour. “You don’t do anything by halves, kid.”

Peter spits into the toilet bowl with a groan.

“Think it’s over for now?”

All Peter can do is shrug.

Tony loops an arm around the front of his shoulders to ease him upright, flushes the toilet, pulls a wad of toilet paper from the holder and dabs at Peter’s mouth with it. Peter is past the point of embarrassment. He’s utterly spent.

A rasp of fur against his leg makes him smile without thinking.

“Get out of here,” Tony reprimands the dog quietly, but Peter cracks his eyelids open to watch Kobol squirming against Tony’s hold to get to him and finds that the fondness that unfurls in the base of his chest is a pleasant distraction from his nausea.

“Let him in if he wants.”

The moment Kobol is allowed into the bathroom, he beelines for Peter and plants himself protectively over his feet.

Peter rasps out a laugh. “Good boy.”

“Here’s some water and a couple of wet towels to bring down the fever,” wafts Pepper’s voice from the doorway. Tony goes to meet her, the loss of his presence at Peter’s side soothed by Kobol’s grounding weight against his legs. They proceed to talk in voices low enough Peter can tell they’re being discreet but not low enough that he can’t make out their words:

“Tony, he’s been sick three times since he joined school. That’s not normal.”

“You’re telling me?”

“Do you think it’s about… the Room?”   


“Probably. Everything’s about the Room.”

Another fit of retching that takes even Peter himself by surprise breaks apart their conversation, compelling Pepper to thrust the items into Tony’s hands, Tony to drop them at Peter’s feet and resume comfortingly rubbing his back, Kobol to evacuate his spot in favour of crouching beneath the sink, and Peter to collapse over the rim of the toilet yet again, staring through watering eyes at the mess he’s expelling.

“Keep breathing, Pete.”

“Fuck,” he mutters for no real reason.   


“Hey.” Although his eyes are trained on white porcelain, Peter can assume that Tony’s brow is furrowing right now. 

“You said I could swear once this year.”

“When did I say that?”   


“The 5th of March.”   


“You’re making that up.”   


“No. You know I remember everything. You said,  _ you know what, Peter, you can _ \--”

A gag cuts off his speech.

“This sucks,” he can’t help but say once he thinks it’s safe to do so again, arms pillowing his head against the toilet bowl.

Tony hums in sympathy. “I think we need to go see Dr. Roberts.”

Peter sighs.

“I know. It won’t be fun. But neither is this. Bud, we just - we just need to make sure you’re all good.” 

\---

They spend a while in hospital limbo the next morning, Tony rattling off their peculiar predicament to a dozen different staff members while Peter leans heavily against Pepper, but at last Doctor Roberts emerges from the bustle and calls them into a private room. They start by testing Peter’s blood and urine. This is standard. Peter knows this. Then they put a pressure cuff on his arm and check his oxygen levels. Dr. Roberts sticks a thermometer in his ear. 

“102.2 degrees,” she reads, eyebrows raised in sympathy. “Not a medical emergency, but not fun either.”

Peter just hums vacantly. 

He’s pretty certain he looks a total mess - sweat-drenched, head spinning with nausea, a gross vomit trail down the front of his t-shirt after he’d thrown up yet again in the waiting room - but Tony, Pepper and Kobol don’t seem to mind. His parents are latched on to a hand each and Kobol is tucked against his side, tail flicking interestedly back and forth as everyone talks. It churns at his nerves to return to the hospital he knows so well, the place that had harboured such darkness for him as he took his first steps towards recovering from the Room, but he at least knows Doctor Roberts already.

She studies Peter for a moment but seems to decide it’s not worth talking to him directly. Instead, she looks to Pepper and Tony. “It does make sense that he’s getting sick a lot now he’s in school. You can imagine what a contagious environment it is, and after four years without exposure to any new infections, his immune system might not be up to scratch just yet. Stunted growth is also a likely factor. You said he was… 165 centimetres tall?”

“Last time we measured.”

“Just over five foot four. That falls in a very low percentile for his age.”

“Don’t rub it in, Doctor Roberts,” croaks Peter.

There’s a warm, half-delirious ripple of laughter.

“Nothing wrong with being short,” Tony reprimands him lightly.

“But you hate being short.”

Angling himself away from Peter, Tony blinks innocently at Roberts. “What were you saying, Doc?”   


Despite himself, Peter grins.

“I wouldn’t go so far as to suspect an immunodeficiency disorder; in all likelihood, the instances of infection will become fewer and further between the longer he’s exposed to these environments.”

The blood tests confirm her viewpoint: although Peter’s immune system isn’t malfunctioning, it’s underdeveloped and struggling to keep up with high school germs.

He sighs, lifting a heavy hand and threading his fingers through the fur behind Kobol’s neck. “So what you’re saying is that life decided to deal me another crappy hand?”

“If you think about it in that way,” is the amused response. “It could be crappier. Your antibody level will catch up to your peers eventually.”

“Will I grow any more?”   


“I can’t tell you that for sure, but keep eating a good diet and exercising and there’s a chance.”

“Is there anything you could give me that would make me clear, like… five foot six? At least?”

“No, Peter,” she chuckles.

Tony squints fondly down at him. “I think that’s enough questions, kid.”

“Um,” Peter falters.

Tony raises his eyebrows.

“One more?”   


“...okay?”   


Peter swallows thickly. “Doctor Roberts, have you got a, a bucket, or something to, uh… because I think I’m about to--”

He narrowly misses Kobol’s newly-groomed white fur and hits his own lap instead.

* * *

_ 19th January 2022 _

“What’s making you anxious right now, Peter?” Amy asks.

His heart is hammering, brain spitting static, palms sweating. He’s only just realised.   


“I’m… you can tell?”   


“I’m your therapist, it’s my job to tell,” she remarks with a small smile. “Have you been having a difficult time with any symptoms?”   


“It’s been, uh… hard. Yeah.”

Kobol jumps up onto the couch, abandoning Bear on the carpet in exchange for seeking Peter’s attention. The familiar soft butting of his head against Peter’s palm soothes the tempest of his thoughts a little, helps fine-tune the words on the tip of his tongue.

“It’s like my brain is trying to trick me all the time. And... I try box breathing and I try problem solving but using techniques just feels so stupid when what’s going through my head is so…  _ big _ .”

“Are you experiencing more flashbacks?”

_ The weight, the crushing weight of him over Peter-- _

_ Hot breath and cloying sweat-- _

_ “You make the sweetest noises,” he’d muttered to him once, a sickly remark which flooded Peter’s throat with honey and expired milk. _

_ He’d shut his mouth tight, ground his teeth together until they ached in the hours afterwards when he lay awake in the pool of filth his bed had become, but the whimpers escaped from his nose instead, begging to be released. _

“Yeah,” concedes Peter, dragging a hand down his face. Kobol juts his chin upwards to slow the harsh movement with softness; he lets his hand drop and glide along his dog’s back instead. “It’s - little moments, all the time, and I have to remember where I am all over again. Nowhere feels  _ safe _ . And I’m just, I’m  _ so tired _ of it.”

Tears have been just around the corner for days now. Peter doesn’t know whether to welcome them or run from them.

But Kobol is here, eager, comforting, attentive.

_ “You make the sweetest--” _   


“You know, I keep thinking about... I don't know why it bothers me so much. He never put my clothes back on after. That was - I always did that.” 

A thousand recollections reel through his mind: tugging his own t-shirt back into place, pulling up his pants with the heat of shame darkening his cheeks, sometimes reaching to grab them from the floor, sometimes wondering if it was even worth putting them on in the first place when he’d just be parted from them against his will again and again and again.

“He… he took them off, I put them back on again, and I never made him - I don’t know, I could’ve at least told him to put them back on.” It’s a rambling, unsatisfactory statement, but it’s a thought he needs to exorcise, that’s been clawing at him for release.

Amy watches him carefully. She is always careful, measured, put-together, at odds to Peter’s messiness. “But you told me before what happened when you tried to resist, remember? He threatened Tony?”   


“Sometimes he just hit me.”

_ When the click of the door failed to wake him, Larry’s hands did instead. _

_ Peter jerks awake. There are hands fumbling at the waistband of his boxers, sickeningly familiar hands. His pyjama bottoms are already around his knees. _

_ He doesn’t think, just flinches into himself and away from the hands. _

_ Larry slaps him. _

_ It’s way more painful than Peter had imagined. A needling sting sears across the side of his face, stunning him into complacency. Larry grabs his hips and pulls them round so he’s got Peter on his stomach and just-- _

_ Does it. _

“He  _ just  _ hit you?” presses Amy.   


Peter shrugs. “He hit me.”   


“He  _ hit _ you.”

Peter’s throat constricts. “Can you please stop saying that?” he asks her tightly.

“Peter, you were abused,” she cuts in. “It wasn’t your fault.”

_ Abused abused abused abused abused-- _

_ Grunting creaking whimpering-- _

_ His whimpers sounded pathetic even to his own ears. _

He inhales, exhales. It gives him no relief. “But I just - I was so stupid. I should’ve told someone when he was following me, and then I wouldn’t have gotten into such a mess, and I should’ve - I could’ve stopped him.”

“There was nothing you could have done. I know that’s a very hard truth to face, but it’s one you have to accept. Nothing that was done to you was your fault.”

Peter’s whole body shakes with the effort of holding back his tears. As a last resort, he squeezes his eyes shut and buries his face in Kobol’s neck. His dog just winds himself further around him. 

“It feels like it is,” he admits brokenly.

“It isn’t. I promise you that you are not to blame.”

_ “Stop, please stop, pick me instead, Larry, pick me instead.” _

She looks at him, really looks at him, and says to him, “You were  _ twelve.” _

_ Twelve. _

_ “Turning into a little slut, aren’t you?” _

Peter had known a sob would arrive soon but he hadn’t expected it to be so painful, so choked.

“I’m very sorry, Peter.” Amy sets down her notepad and leans slightly towards him, neat sympathy in her features. “I think it would be good if you took a moment to let all that emotion out.”

The emotion arrives regardless of his consent. He hunches around Kobol, Kobol who is an emblem of his new, free life, and Kobol nuzzles him and kisses him with fervour and thumps his tail worriedly against the couch.

Peter weeps.

“Sorry,” he chokes out.   


Amy shakes her head kindly. “It’s absolutely fine. Crying is a release.”

She tells him this every time.

Peter clings to Kobol for dear life, and he is with him. The storm abates.

* * *

_ 1st February _

They’re hosing down a muddy Kobol in the yard when Tony flicks the end up towards Peter. He can’t say why he does it. It’s a moment of madness.

Peter gapes at him.

Now that he’s thinking straight again, Tony hopes the kid, who had been very helpfully massaging away clods of dirt from the dog and now is soaked with water, won’t hate him for too long for his misjudgement.

An aforementioned clod of dirt comes sailing promptly through the air. It hits him smack across the face.

Peter looks a little shocked by his own actions, but Tony supposes he had it coming.

Chaos breaks out.

“What the hell was that, Tony?”   


“You threw mud in my  _ face!” _

“You started it!”

Peter ducks down behind Kobol to avoid Tony’s powerful stream of water but his dog has other ideas; Kobol bounds away playfully, chasing the spray with his mouth. 

“What is this?”

Pepper’s there, hands on hips.

Tony and Peter look at each other.

Then, in a move that surprises them both, she grabs the hose Peter had managed to commandeer and sprays Tony with it.

_ “Pep!” _

She just cackles at him. Peter drops to his knees with the force of his own peals of laughter.

“Stop ganging up on me!” Tony tries to yell from behind the spraying water.

He’s met with yet more laughter. Unbelievable.

* * *

_ 7th February 2022 _

A speeding car down a rural lane, a lead that’s not quite secured, and an excitable Samoyed.

There’s silence after Kobol falls. The car halts. Peter freezes. The very breeze seems to pause in its progress.

The moment it finishes reeling through his mind - Kobol running out towards the SUV, dragged down beneath the wheel, him staring dumbly down at the lead that shouldn’t have extended but did, it let Kobol run out, it let him fall,  _ he _ let him fall - Peter judders back into action, breaking into a sprint to reach the car.

“Baby. Kobol! Baby? Oh,  _ God. _ ”

Kobol whines, an awful, mournful, terrified whine; Peter drops to his knees by his dog and hovers his hands over him uselessly. His bloodstream is a tidal wave.

A car door slams. Footsteps. Peter looks upwards in tandem with Kobol to watch a middle-aged man in a quilted gilet approach them, grey at the temples, shoes scuffed and worn, horror all over his expression.

Peter’s breath quickens further.

“Oh my God,” mutters the man as he draws near the whimpering Kobol. “Oh  _ no. _ I am so sorry, son. I was over the limit - I thought nobody was here...”

“ _ I’m _ sorry,” Peter blurts. “The lead wasn’t on properly, I let him run off--”

The next cry that escapes Kobol is too much. Peter inhales, stutters, then dissolves into tears.

The man stands over them both with widened eyes, dragging a hand up and down his stubble. “I ran over a kid’s dog. This is a nightmare. F--heck.”

Peter can’t help but agree.

His heart hammers faster, faster, faster, faster, until it’s fit to burst, and he still doesn’t know what he’s supposed to do. “Baby,” he manages to say, setting a shaking hand atop kobol’s head as he howls miserably.

This seems to urge the man to action at last. “Take a breath, kid,” he begins half-hesitantly and half-comfortingly.

It’s when a hand lands on Peter’s shoulder that he jolts away.

_ You’re cute when you’re all worked up-- _

Kobol’s mewls drag him back to reality. His vision clears. Above him, the man only looks more concerned.

“Sorry,” he chokes. “I, uh, I get jumpy when I’m stressed.”

“No worries. You have good reason to be stressed.”

Peter nods jerkily. He blinks once and Kobol is drenched in blood. Blinks again, a creamy haze clearing from his vision like soap from a window, and sees white fur, open eyes, a twisted leg appearing to be his dog’s only ailment.

Crouching down by them, the man offers a hybrid of a smile and a grimace. “I’m Todd.”

Peter lets himself smile.

“Todd Miller.”

_ Miller? _

_ Miller Larry Miller listen to me please Larry Todd Miller Larry Larry let’s go to bed the victims have chosen not to disclose the nature of their time in captivity life sentence without parole-- _

Kobol still whines in his ear.

Clearing his closed-up throat, Peter murmurs, “You don’t… have you…?”   


“Sorry, son, you’re gonna have to speak up a little.” Todd’s brow furrows further.

_ Does he look like Larry? Does he sound like him? Miller Miller Miller-- _

“You don’t have any family members in prison?”

“Prison?”

“I just, I heard someone on the news with that surname.” 

“Nope. I’ve had a couple of points off my license for speeding, to tell you the truth. Ironic, really.” Todd’s mouth snaps shut at that; he hurriedly pursues a new tactic, clapping his palms onto his knees. “But - no fear. There are no criminals among us.”

_ Criminal criminal life sentence without parole Miller-- _

Peter’s not content, but he has to be. Kobol still lies before him in pain and it’s Peter’s responsibility to look after him, Larry be damned.

_ Todd is a nice man. _ He forces the thought into his mind, studying the concern in the man’s eyes, the determined way he unzips his gilet and dials a number on his phone, the safe distance he now keeps from Peter, and finds most of him agreeing.

“This is the vet’s, right?” says Todd loudly into the receiver. “My hands are shaking, I might have dialled the wrong - you are? Great.”

Peter focuses on stroking his dog, avoiding the crooked leg. Kobol’s whines lessen.

“There you go, baby boy. Silly boy. I’m right here. We’re gonna cart you off to the vet soon, fix up that leg. Didn’t I train you  _ not _ to chase cars, huh? Why did you decide that was a good idea?”

“Is he a large dog, you said?” Todd falters. “Well, ma’am, I… suppose he could be classified as large?”   


Peter nods.

Todd chuckles hesitantly. “The owner confirms. He is large.”

He listens to the response; Peter continues his stream of whispered rambling to Kobol.

“Okay, son,” Todd begins eventually, phone stowed away again, “They want us to carry him in there so he can be transported.”

“I’m Peter.”   


“Peter.”

They share a smile. The more Peter gets to know Todd, the more he sets himself apart from Larry, and the more Peter begins to like him and his funny outfit and his salt-and-pepper hair and his awkward humour.

“I have a blanket in the back. Hold on.” Todd pulls open the back door of the SUV and emerges with a thick tartan cloth. 

“Good for drying off when your son pushes you into the lake during a fishing session.”

A bark of laughter bubbles up in Peter’s chest.

Sliding the blanket gently under Kobol, they take half of it each so it acts as a big sling and walk him to the car. Peter slides in next to him in the back row and Todd circles around to the driver’s seat.

There’s a faint  _ click _ as Todd shuts his own door, and suddenly Peter’s in a locked car with a stranger.

He clenches his jaw. Drives every ounce of his energy towards keeping Kobol calm. Allows no thoughts of how powerless he’s just made himself into his head.

He hasn’t even called Tony yet.

Just as he’s about to do just that, Todd drops his hands heavily onto the steering wheel and turns back in his seat. 

Peter’s pulse quickens unbidden.

_ "Come on, I won't bite. This'll be fun. It’ll feel so good." _

Todd casts about for a moment, then sighs. “Now, son… I know that in this day and age it’s not always advisable to get into a stranger’s car, and that you seemed a little on edge about family and criminals and… I just want to assure you that I was telling God’s honest truth about my criminal record, my family’s too. Closest I’ve been to a prison is a correctional driver’s course. I don’t intend to change that today. So I hope you can… relax a little back there?”

It’s sincere.

“Yeah.” Blowing out a grounding breath, Peter settles in his seat. “Yeah, that’s - thank you for saying that.” He hesitates for a moment, then says, “I trust you.”

Todd brightens, looking relieved.

That moment of honesty appears to break the ice between them for good. Shifting the car into gear, Todd glances back once more at the fretful boy and his wounded dog before easing them forwards.

“I promise I won’t go over the limit this time,” he adds.

Peter cracks a smile.

“I’m gonna call my dad,” he reminds himself aloud.

“Sure thing.”

Tony picks up on the second ring: when it’s Peter, he always does.

_ “Hey, kid.”  _

“Hi.” Peter bites his lip, dreading the ensuing reaction to his words. He begins vaguely: “So… something, uh, something kinda happened.” 

There’s a harsh scraping sound. So much for keeping Tony from reacting severely.  _ “I’m on my way,” _ he rushes. _ “Where are you at?”  _

“Well, I’m - I’ll explain first.” 

In an instant, Tony’s voice goes from worried to thunderous.  _ “No, you tell me where you are right now.”  _

Peter pauses, scratching under Kobol’s chin.

“I’m in a guy’s car.” 

“ _ Peter. _ ”

“He’s really nice and his name is Todd and Kobol ran out by his car and we think his leg is broken but it totally wasn’t Todd’s fault, it really wasn’t, I swear, it was the stupid lead extension, and we’re going to the vet and he promised he’d take me straight there.”

Another agonising pause ensues, lasting several seconds. Peter catches Todd glancing at him in the rearview mirror. Even Kobol’s eyes are fixed on him.

_ “Is he threatening you?”  _ The tone is low, urgent.

“No!” Peter cries. “He’s just driving. I’m fine, Tony.”  _ Larry Miller Larry Miller Miller Miller--  _ “I know. But I’m fine.” 

_ “Let me talk to him,” _ demands Tony instantly.

“I’ll put it on speaker.” Before he can do so, he adds, “Don’t yell at him, please.” 

Leaning forward in his seat, he prepares Todd for the inevitable. “So, uh… he wants to say something to you, but try not to feel too threatened by it. He’s just - protective.” 

Todd shrugs. “World’s a dangerous place. I can see why he’d want to be protective.” 

“Okay, but really.” 

“Go ahead, son,” he urges with a slight squint of amusement.

“He’s on speaker, Tony,” sighs Peter, tapping the icon.

Tony must have his mouth right by the speaker of his own phone, because his icy words emanate from Peter’s phone with overwhelming clarity.  _ “Listen up, Todd, and listen up with everything you’ve got, because I want you to understand what I am telling you. If you even think about trying anything with my kid - if you harm one hair on his head - there is nowhere you can go where I won’t find you and bring the full extent of justice over your head.”  _

Todd’s jaw drops.

“Tony, please stop,” Peter hisses, angling the phone away from Todd. “I swear, he’s not a bad guy.”

_ “Well,” _ Tony spits back, _ “You could’ve sworn that Larry wasn’t a bad guy either, isn’t that right?”  _

Peter freezes in his tracks.

He hits the speaker button, but it’s already too late. Todd’s fixing that concerned gaze on him that everyone always does when they learn what happened. He can’t turn away, but he curls up in his seat and faces the window instead.

_ “Tony, _ ” he says quietly. 

_ “Fuck, Peter. You can’t just…” _

“I can. I wouldn’t be so calm about this if I wasn’t certain I’d be okay. Please, don’t make me more stressed.” 

_ “Okay.” _ There’s a sigh, and then Tony softens. _ “You’re just heading to the closest vet to home?”  _

“Yeah. You can track me there if you want.”

The tracking app on Peter’s phone was designed by Tony to work at all times, no matter who tampered with his phone or in what way. Tony knows it even better than him, but it’s a reminder of the extra layer of security.

_ “I’ll meet you as soon as I can get there. Stay alert. Call or text if anything goes south, or use your panic button if you can’t.” _

“I know.”

It’s hidden in a pendant on a bracelet Peter wears every day. Peter turns it over in his hand without thinking.

_ “I love you, kid.”  _ It comes through his phone riddled with splinters.

“I’m gonna be fine,” Peter tells him firmly. “I love you too.”

Tony disconnects the call himself. Peter hopes that’s a good sign.

“So,” Todd begins with clearly feigned nonchalance. “I’m getting the feeling something went on to do with you and your dad that I’m not aware of.”

“Um - yes.” Peter runs his thumb along Kobol’s ear, watching him relax at the touch. “Yeah.”

“If you don’t want to bring it up, that’s absolutely fine,” Todd rushes to say. “I should’ve said that earlier.”

“No, it’s - yes. Something bad happened. To both of us. For a long time. That’s why I call him Tony, not dad - he adopted me after we met during the… bad time.”

Todd shifts in his seat, looking deep in thought.

“Well, it sounds like he has good reason to be worried for you,” he says eventually.

“Yeah, he does.”

* * *

Half an hour sees Peter and Todd in the waiting room of the local vet, restless on hard plastic chairs.

Peter’s phone vibrates.

“Tony’s about to come in,” he reads from the screen. “Maybe you should - uh… I feel like it would be better if you weren’t here.” 

Todd holds up his hands with an easy grin. “I understand that. Don’t want an angry dad after me.” 

They stand together. Peter rushes to fit in everything he wants to say to the man. “Thank you for everything. For driving me here and staying with me and helping Kobol out and being so nice.” 

“It was a pleasure, son. I hope Kobol ends up alright.” 

“Well, he’ll have me fussing over him for the next couple of weeks.”

Todd laughs along with him at the admittance. “Well, then, he’ll have the best of care,” he says. “Alright. It’s been nice… knowing you?”

“I guess so. Yeah. You too.”

There’s a moment of awkward hesitation as Peter wonders whether he’s supposed to go in for a hug, whether Todd will, or whether they’ll just turn away from each other, before Todd extends his hand. Peter grips it and shakes it with a smile, relieved.

Todd nods once, then turns on his heel and strolls out of Peter’s sight.

Almost immediately after comes a growing clamour of noise. A familiar voice begins to rattle off short, tense sentences to the receptionist. “I’m here for a kid. He brought in a Samoyed. Short, brown eyes…no, I’m talking about the kid now. Yeah, I’m his dad. Tony Stark. Can I please see him?”

Peter gets to his feet before Tony can harass any more members of staff and jogs over. On the other side of the desk is Tony, looking frantic; Peter waves at him.

In a flurry of movement, Tony skirts round the side of the desk and bundles him into a desperate hug.

“Oh, thank God, kid,” he breathes shakily as he rubs a hand up and down Peter’s back. “Fucking hell. Holy shit. You little menace.”

Chuckling, Peter lets himself sag into the embrace. The last dregs of his adrenaline rush desert him rapidly, leaving him dizzy and exhausted but relieved. Kobol is being treated and Tony is holding him. He has all he needs just now.

“I had to get him to the vet,” he protests in a mumble.

“I know you did. You did good. You just also freaked me the hell out for a little bit.”

Tony pulls away from him then, scanning the length of him, straightening his coat and scarf, tucking away loose strands of his hair, face taut with still-present anxiety. “You’re really fine? He didn’t try to…?”

Peter understands.

“He didn’t try to do anything,” he assures Tony. To get him to stop fussing, he encloses his hand in both of his own. “He was actually really nice.” 

“Where is he?”

“He left.” 

Tony jerks. “He  _ left?” _

“I told him to. I knew you’d intimidate him.”

Tony opens his mouth as if to argue, then settles for sighing and pressing a kiss to the crown of Peter’s head. Peter leans into the touch, tipping until his forehead rests on Tony’s shoulder. 

Resting a hand across the back of Peter’s neck, Tony murmurs, “I am proud of you, Pete. I really am.” 

Peter smiles. “Thanks.” 

“How’s our baby?” 

It’s a deliberate, slightly clunky return to normalcy, but Peter appreciates it all the same. 

He rattles off all the information he can recall. “They’re giving him an X-ray right now to see what’s going on with his leg, and they said they’d give him non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs so he wouldn’t feel any more pain.” 

“Okay.” Tony studies him. “So the plan of action is to sit and wait?” 

“Uh-huh.” 

“Sounds like a good idea. I think we could both use a breather.” 

Tony Stark replaces Todd Miller next to Peter on the hard chairs and settles an arm around his shoulder. He smiles as Peter settles into his side.

They wait.

* * *

_ 2nd June 2022 _

_ “Peter Benjamin Parker.” _

Tony, Pepper and Rhodey bolt up from their seats and cheer and holler and whistle and clap and make absolute fools of themselves.

There’s the kid, almost tripping and falling on his own graduation gown as he walks onto the stage but recovering himself at the last moment. He receives his high school diploma with garish orange plugs in his ears to protect him from the clamour of the crowd, Kobol trotting happily beside him, and a beam lighting up his face. He  _ gets his high school diploma. _

Pepper has her phone camera trained on the kid. She makes up for her inability to clap by whooping like a maniac. “That’s our boy!” she cries.

There he is.

There he is, the boy who two years ago had nothing but Tony, his abuser, and a single, stifling room, and who now has finished high school.

“Look at him,” he says, finding that he’s much more choked up than he’d anticipated. “He’s just - look. I think I might explode with pride. Against all the fucking odds, there he is.”

Then Tony realises he’s crying.

Pepper swivels her phone to record him for a moment as he looks out towards Peter. “You owe me five, kid,” she says. “Told you he’d cry.”   


Rhodey tugs him to his side with equal fondness and sarcasm. “All grown up, huh?”

“All grown up.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> YOU GUYS. BOY DO I HAVE A STORY FOR YOU  
> idk if any of you know the heartstopper comics? by alice oseman?? (if you don't i DARE YOU to click this link - https://www.webtoons.com/en/challenge/heartstopper/list?title_no=329660   
> \- because i recommend it to everyone, it's got adorable teenage romance and amazing LGBT representation!!!) if you do know it you'll know that the series is officially coming to netflix!!  
> i heard this news on the 20th and was ecstatic! ... for about two minutes, before the part of my brain that constantly pines for acting projects kicked in and made me feel really pretty sad about not having a chance to audition or anything. i prayed on it and didn't feel that i'd gotten an answer. i genuinely considered emailing alice oseman herself being like 'uhh is there anywhere i can audition for your show pls' but decided i'd wait a day or two...  
> and i got through half of the next day slowly coming to terms with the fact that i'd just have to try and enjoy watching the show when it came out and give it up...  
> AND THEN, LIKE A BOLT FROM HEAVEN, CAME AN INSTAGRAM POST ABOUT AN OPEN CASTING CALL FOR HEARTSTOPPER  
> NOT ONLY DID I SEE IT ON SOCIAL MEDIA BUT MY AGENT EMAILED IT TO EVERYONE IN MY COMPANY  
> i'm just so grateful and over the moon because i've been given a chance!!!!! i mean obviously i'll probably never hear back from this and i'll have to give it up in the end anyway. but i just wanted a *chance*. and i GOT ONE AND I'M SO EXCITED TO REPLY HERE COMES HOURS OF CHARACTER RESEARCH WISH ME LUCK  
> thank you for reading guys lmao


	3. Gorgeous mess

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Allo lads, i'm back and it gets angstier :) that's all!  
> There are some quite direct and intense recollections of past sexual abuse in this chapter. Stay safe :)

_ 1st May 2023 _

It’s 6 am. The gloomy bruise of the sky is slowly dissipating into brightness. Peter can’t understand why nobody is ever up at this time, because it’s undoubtedly the most beautiful time of day. It seems as if every strike of his sneakers against the ground draws a little more warmth into the city around him. It’ll be hot by midday, but right now, it’s pleasantly cool, cool enough that Kobol can run with him without overheating. His extendable lead is attached to the waistband of Peter’s running shorts.

Running clears Peter’s mind. It’s just him, the dog, the rush of air against his skin, the pull of his muscles, and the path he’s on. The added benefit is that, this early in the morning, it’s empty enough that he doesn’t have to get close enough to anyone to feel nervous. 

Peter’s only problem is that he sometimes loses track of time and has to run straight to class still coated in sweat. But it’s a small price to pay for the simultaneous thrill and calm of running.

He doesn’t think he’ll ever get over the exhilarating feeling of running, running, running, and never meeting a wall.

Oh, shit. It’s not 6 am, it’s 8--

Peter turns and sprints for home.

* * *

_ 10th July 2023 _

Maybe half an hour ago, Peter had actually been paying attention to the TV, but, well -  _ Shazam  _ is good, but MJ playing with his hair is undoubtedly better.

He’s spent a lot of time thinking. Is it weird that she’s the one who plays with his hair? That she’s the one pulling him close right now? That he doesn’t remember ever initiating anything more than a hug?

It feels almost criminal sometimes, getting into her arms and knowing that she  _ doesn’t _ know. Peter dreads what will happen if she decides to go further than the kiss she gives him now. Right now, she’s just tangled lovingly around him on the couch. This is fine. This doesn’t feel like anything other than itself, other than MJ, other than  _ Shazam _ on the TV and Kobol pattering around to make sure he knows where everyone is, other than MJ and him and MJ. But one advance, and it could all overturn.

But Peter can’t predict the future. All he knows is this. MJ. He tightens his grip around her. Her lips curl into an unwittingly fond smile. So Peter kisses her back. 

Seeing this, Kobol decides that he can’t let it continue unless he butts in for kisses of his own, starting to clamber up and over them in the way he does when he forgets he’s not a puppy anymore.

Michelle swears then chokes out a laugh as Kobol’s paw hits her stomach.

“Did he get you?” Peter asks her through peals of laughter.

_ “Ugh,” _ is all MJ says.

Kobol turns around, punching them both a lot more with his paws, but eventually settles down so he’s sprawled over them. Peter laughs right from his belly.

_ “You’re holding back, Peter. You're being a bad boy. Remember what happens when you're a bad boy?" _

He’ll tell her about what Larry did. He’ll tell her some day.

Just not right now.

* * *

_ 3rd September _

“That’s a handsome dog you’ve got there.”

Peter whirls around in the alley, trying to find the source of the comment. He finds a haggard man in a doorway he hadn’t even noticed as he walked by.

“Uh - thank you, sir.”

Usually Peter gives some cash to homeless folks he walks by, but he’d been hurrying home as the night drew in. It’s dark now and he can’t make out this guy’s face, can’t tell him apart from anybody. In fact - this guy doesn’t seem like he’s living on the streets, now Peter gets a better look at him. Just hanging around them. Which is usually bad news, considering Peter’s past experience with a strange man in a dark alleyway.

_ Bag over his head - knife sharp and terrifying against his back - a man breathing down his neck, trapping his hands, shoving him into a dark place that rumbles and tosses him around-- _

“Where’d you get him from?”

Peter hesitates.

“I’m thinking of getting one myself,” the man says, smiling.

“A breeder.” Peter’s reluctant to tell this guy anything specific. He tries to be nice all the same. “Always go and see the parents if you’re looking for a puppy. That way you can check if they’re well-bred.”

“I imagine this one’s well-bred, then?”

Peter doesn’t know what he’s supposed to say anymore. “Sure,” he mutters, making a move to leave--

But the guy blocks his path.

Peter’s insides are churning and churning and churning.

Too scared to try and talk, he just turns on his heel and goes the other way.

He doesn’t think. He doesn’t even  _ think  _ about why the guy had asked those specific questions, just thinks of Larry and the knife and the zip ties, but - of  _ course. _

It doesn’t make it any less shocking when Peter feels the handle of Kobol’s lead pull out of his hand.

_ Kobol. _

A high-pitched bark echoes behind Peter. He whips around, panic stirring up in him in an instant. 

The guy - the thief - he’s holding Kobol. Running away with him.

Peter wastes precious moments standing there, not understanding. Someone’s taking his dog away.  _ Kobol. _

Then he lurches after them. He can’t let the guy take him. That’s all he knows. Red-hot adrenaline pushes through his veins. 

Peter knows how to box. He’s never done it on a person, never without gloves, but he can throw a few punches. And he has to save his dog.

He aims a jab at the thief’s neck, and the guy stumbles, choking. He grabs at the lead handle. The thief drops Kobol, who scatters. Thank God. But now Peter’s facing this guy, this guy who’s got a good six inches and fifty pounds on him, this guy who is  _ pissed. _

The first punch Peter swings actually connects with the thief’s nose, sending him rocking back. Peter’s knuckles blare in pain. Of course, the win doesn’t last. Nervous energy is overwhelming Peter, too potent to let through coherent thought. The thief hits him in the face once, twice, two dizzy blows which throw him off balance, before he even thinks to start dodging.

Peter doesn’t want to fight. But he’s got to end this.

The thief preempts Peter’s swerve and fists a hand in his jacket and pins him, shuddering ribs and shaking legs and fast-bruising face and all, against a wall. Peter’s pinned against a wall. He’s--

_ Ears ringing, gasping for breath, legs trembling against the strain, the agony-- _

_ Fumbling hands at his-- _

_ Trapped in his own filthy body-- _

_ “Turning into a real--” _

“Got any cash on you?” demands the thief, unearthing Peter's phone and pocketing it, just inches away - no, no inches at all, pressed up against Peter, hands fumbling, but not searching for skin--

Peter can’t speak.

“Are you stupid? Where’s your fucking wallet?”

Peter’s throat burns. He's struggling for oxygen with the thief constricting him and the crushing weight of his memories. “I - I…”

“What?”

Peter brings his knee up and jams it into the thief’s crotch.

Finally, he gets off of him, doubling over, and Peter drags in as much air as he can manage. His head's spinning, his jaw and cheek and nose aching already. He starts to stumble out of the godforsaken alley--

But he's yanked back by the neck as the thief gets him in a headlock. His air is gone again. 

Reacting purely on instinct, Peter lets all his weight sag to the floor. Both him and the thief crash to the ground, and although Peter’s face scrapes along the concrete, he's free for another golden moment. 

He gets in a flailing kick to the thief's abdomen. The guy barely flinches. 

He's clearly fought before. Peter hates fighting. He hates this. His pulse is painfully fast, his bloodstream thundering through his head. He can't believe that nobody's heard any of this yet.

He's alone.

The thief hits him until he can't get back up again. Peter spits out blood. He's on his side and the thief starts kicking out at him. Peter feels his ribs bruise under the pressure of his boot. Oh, God. This could really be it.

_ Bark! _

_ "Shit!" _

Lifting his gaze, Peter sees it: Kobol with his teeth clamped around the thief's ankle, eyes narrow and dark.

_ That's my boy! _

Peter takes his chance. Grabbing at the backs of the thief's legs, he rises to a crouch and topples him over with his weight. The thief's face cracks loudly against the ground. He's down. He's down.

Peter jumps up, keeps his fists up just in case. Kobol is pacing around the prone body. The fight's over, but Peter's mind is still in the middle of it. Tapping the guy's side hesitantly with a foot, he sees that he's not about to attack him again so rolls him over. He needs his phone.

There's blood running down the thief's face. 

It takes that sight for Peter to realise that he's bleeding too.

He doesn't want to get close to this guy any more than he needs to, so he grabs his phone then makes a break for the end of the alleyway and towards the safety of the rest of the world. He's gotta make his own escape this time.

Okay, okay. He's still got all his clothes on, check. He's not gonna pass out right this moment, though his entire body throbs up and down like it might malfunction any minute. He's felt that before. He can deal with that.

Kobol's following him around now, lead handle clattering along the ground. Peter lets himself go for a moment, gives himself the time to stick his face in his fur for a minute and ignore that he's getting bloodstains in the dog's fur. "You were such a good boy, baby," he says. "Why do bad things always happen to me, huh? I must have some sort of bad luck curse on me."

Shit, his knuckles are split. And his phone's broken from the thief falling on it. Of course.

He's gonna have to walk home. And… hope that he can call 911 in time to put this guy away.

Now the fog of adrenaline is finally clearing from his brain, Peter's feeling the extent of his injuries. His eye is swelling up. The agonising pull in his ribs makes it hard to walk, but he walks. He grabs Kobol's lead in his busted hands and picks him up for good measure, never wanting to lose him again.

Just got to get home.

As he limps out of the alleyway, he swears he sees someone he recognises. Someone who's face creases, someone who starts to sprint towards him in the dark, and Peter can't take any more suspense.

"Christ, kid - what the hell happened? What's this?"

"Tony," Peter breathes, and the name strips away all his toughness until all he can do is collapse into the man, Kobol squished between them both. Tony rushes to hold him up. That’s good. Peter really needs someone to hold him up for a minute.

"You're hurt," Tony says, and Peter hasn't heard him this scared in years - maybe rightfully so. "You've gotta tell me what went on."

"A guy tried to take Kobol," is all Peter can say.

Tony cards a hand through Peter's hair. It quiets his pain for a minute.  _ "Take _ Kobol? Steal him?"

Peter nods. "You might want to call 911. He's passed out in that alley."

There's a slow, measured breath from above Peter. Then, Tony's easing Kobol out of his arms. He lowers Peter down softly, slowly, to sit against a storefront. Not slowly enough. Peter groans.

"Woah, woah, woah. What is it? Your ribs?"

Peter hums in agreement. "He hit me quite a lot. I'm not actually that good of a boxer."

Tony laughs but it sounds pained. He looks down at Peter with an unbearable amount of fondness and concern, and Peter thinks of the way it was in the Room, with Peter fretting over Tony’s broken body. 

"Okay, kid,” he huffs, bemused. “Of course you had to go and fight the guy."

Peter squints at him as he realises-- "Why are you here?"

With a humourless laugh, Tony says, "I wanted to do a surprise visit."

Peter thinks he's still pretty loopy from the thrill of the fight when he remarks, "Well, consider me surprised."

Tony just shakes his head, getting out his phone. While he makes the call to the emergency services, he leaves a reassuring hand on Peter's shoulder, not manhandling him, not pinning him, just there, supporting him. 

Kobol licks fretfully at his face while he sits there.

"Don't worry about me, K. We're still together. And we're both still kicking, right? That's all that really matters."

* * *

_ 26th October  _

“Kobol, I know you’re not great at giving advice, but I just need to talk. Can you listen?”

Kobol eyes him. 

There’s nothing but honest devotion in those eyes. Kobol always looks like he's listening to all of your words, like he’ll go on listening forever as long as you keep on talking.

“Kobol.” Peter can hardly say it. He can’t get it out of his stupid throat. “I think that… Kobol, I think I - c’mon. Crap. I think I like Harley.”

Kobol lets him talk.

“I don’t know what’s wrong with me. I thought that… that it couldn’t happen, right? I can’t have hated what Larry did and like guys. That doesn’t work. But it’s happening. But I liked MJ. But I like Harley. But I didn’t like Larry.”

Kobol just burrows further around him, warm and velvet-soft and calming.

“I don’t understand myself,” Peter whispers. “I don’t get me. I don’t get me.”

* * *

_ 22nd February 2024 _

There’s a difference between the way Harley moves when he’s calm and the way he moves when he’s stressed. When Peter figured that out, he’s not sure, but he can tell that the way Harley is picking up his keys and coat on the other end of the apartment is definitely a sign of stress.

He ducks out of his room and intercepts Harley at the door. Harley’s all slumped into himself, the way he always is when he’s in the middle of editing one of his films, but still a whirlwind of haphazard movement as he grabs random objects from around him.

“Hey - hey, what’s this, babe?”

“Leaving,” Harley mutters. He hardly looks at Peter. 

Peter plants a hand on his shoulder and eases him away from the door for the moment. “Where?”

“Going on a walk or something.”

“Or something.” Peter knows those restless hands. He knows that downcast gaze, that quick breath. “Don’t go to the store.”

Harley shuts his eyes. “Wasn’t gonna.”

But that’s where Harley goes when his hands don’t know what else to do. He’ll bring back doughnuts or cookie dough or ice cream or a sharing pack of something which he won’t share and the cycle will just begin all over again.

“Don’t go out.”   


“I was... I was just gonna get dessert.”

“We don’t need dessert.”

“I know we don’t fucking--” Sighing harshly, Harley throws his stuff to the floor in a heap. “Yikes. Headache. I’m, uh - can you put my stuff back?”

Peter’s already on it.

“Sorry,” Harley says from behind a hand. He always ages about thirty years when he’s like this. Peter gets a glimpse of the exhaustion hidden behind Harley’s near-constant enthusiasm, a deep weariness for the world covered by positive energy.

“No problem,” he responds lightly. It really isn’t. Harley helps him, he helps Harley, and they work. “What happened?”

“Editing is kicking my ass. It just - doesn’t fit.”

“Maybe I can take a look at it? Try and help it fit?”

“Yeah.” A smile, at last. “Yeah, that’d be good.”

“When’s this thing due?”   


“Uh…”

Tomorrow, it turns out. Harley has a number of to-do lists but they don’t seem to have much effect on his organisation. But Peter’s got a plan. He sets Harley up a foot or so away from the computer he’s probably spent the last few hours slaving over and cocoons him strategically in his own comforter, his hands free of the bundle so he can focus himself by stroking the fur of Kobol, who decided to lie all over Harley and join the party. Peter sits at the computer. He even chopped some vegetables in case Harley still craved a snack.

Yeah, he’s a pretty first-class boyfriend. What about it?

“Right. So--” 

Peter clicks something and suddenly the block of stuff he’d presumed was the film footage  _ disappears. _

“Oh my God,” he chokes.  _ “What? _ I did something, I didn’t--”

Harley snorts. “Undo it.”

“Oh.”

“Click on the needle and it’ll move.”

“Uh-huh. I got it. Look, I got it.”

“A gold star for you, Parker, the needle mover.”

“Shut up,” he throws back fondly. “Can I watch it?”

And he watches what’s been done so far and it’s about a character played by one of Harley’s film friends trying to find his purpose in the bustle of New York City as the sun rapidly sets - and it’s  _ amazing. _

And they get to editing. Although Peter’s having to undo a lot of his fumbling attempts at working the software.

“You know,” he remarks, trying to sound as if he just thought of this off the top of his head, “If you don’t end up as the next Spike Lee, the world will have made a big mistake.”

Peter’s pretty sure the sound he just heard was Harley choking on a cucumber slice. “You - you just said--”

“Spike Lee. The pioneer of nuanced racial filmmaking, right? You know he’s an auteur because he calls his films  _ joints.  _ But even though he should have by now, he’s never won an Oscar.”

“Who  _ are you?” _ Harley shrieks. “What’ve you done with my Peter?”

Peter smirks at the computer screen. “Nothing.”

“Hello? Peter? Peter, who I had to remind who  _ Alfred Hitchcock _ is? Peter who can’t separate Lin Manuel-Miranda from Alexander Hamilton?”

“When you see him in Hamilton first, it becomes  _ real, _ okay?”

“I love you,” Harley huffs out. “You’re the bestest person ever.”

It’s flippant and it probably doesn’t mean anything but - Peter’s heart is turning flips in his ribcage. He looks back. Harley’s grinning face, him all swaddled up in his duvet cocoon, it’s too damn much for Peter. He stumbles over to the bed and gives him a big, stupid smack of a kiss.

“Ewww,” pouts Harley. “Do a proper one.”

Cupping the side of Harley’s face, Peter does that. Harley smiles against his lips. Gosh, he’s really lucky.   


“How’re you feeling now, sunshine?” he asks.

“Better. Everything just - got stupid for a moment. My senses were slaying me. Thank you.”

Peter just bops his nose gently against Harley’s.

“I’m so ready to kick you out of the editing chair. You might have googled Spike Lee, but I think Premiere Pro kicked your ass.”

“No, you found me out!”

“You’re easy, Peter Parker.”

“Hey. Stop kicking  _ my _ ass. Go hyperfocus.”   


“I wish. Wouldn’t hyperfocus be a great superpower if you could turn it on and off?”

“Edit,” Peter prompts.   


“Yeah.”

When Harley’s shoulders start to hunch over again and make him look like an old man, Peter smooths out the knots.

* * *

_ 3rd March _

When Tony steps up to the microphone, Peter beams.

“When I started up this little business...” 

Tony lets himself laugh then, looking out at all the hundred of employees and benefactors and representatives from other businesses who are attending this big opening of a brand new  _ everything  _ for Stark Industries. New buildings, new sponsors, new market, new profit for the larger workforce, new charity donations - but, of course, the same direction: secure, reliable tech which safeguards the owner. 

“Stark Industries began as a far-off dream while I worked as a tech consultant. Years later, it came to me while I sat at home, unemployed, in recovery after my kidnapping, wondering what I could do to make my mark on the world again. I could never have guessed that this would grow into something so incredible, and I have each and every one of you in this room to thank for that. So I thank you all sincerely. For making the dream happen. For making our mark. For--"

Kobol, before standing quietly at Peter's side, yanks the lead out of his hands and bolts for the stage.

Peter balks, running after the dog on instinct, but it's clear he won't make it.

The room pauses as Kobol bounds up to Tony and begins to paw at the pocket of his suit jacket.

Tony snorts, then bursts out laughing.

Peter can't understand why until he reaches into the pocket and unearths Bear. Kobol noses after the toy instantly; Tony lets him have it.

Peter gets up on stage to get a hold of Kobol, but he's laughing too. So is the audience now.

"The dog and the son have decided to make an appearance," Tony adds into the microphone, directing a bemused grin down at Peter, who's untangling the mess of rope from Kobol's ankles.

Peter decides he may as well style it out. He smiles and waves to the audience. 

At the back of the room, he can see Rhodey, Pepper and Harley, all falling over themselves.

"Can we get some applause for my son and my dog?"

The audience obliges. Peter bundles Kobol up into his arms although he's enormous now, really too big to carry for long, and takes him back through the crowd to uproarious cheers and smiles.

"Never living that down," he mutters to himself.

* * *

_? _

Peter’s painting just doesn’t  _ fit. _

He’d thought that his past success, Professor Hayes saying things like  _ moving  _ and  _ earth-shattering  _ and his eyes misting over and everything, would send him only upwards. Clearly, the opposite is becoming the case. 

Because all of Peter’s good work has been about the Room. And he doesn’t always want to think about the Room.

“Peter.”

It’s just Harley on the other end of his bedroom door again. Peter hunches back over his bad sketches.

“Pete. Honey.”

Peter draws.

“Peter, it’s the evening. You gotta come out and eat. The dog needs a walk.”

If Peter talks, he’ll never get a good image out of his brain. He sketches faster. He’s just gotta get something on the canvas, something to show to Professor Hayes. He can’t stop.

“You know - shit, Pete, I’m not good at this. You know I see time all fucked-up and I get stuck in my projects. But I know that you always help me when I’m like that. And I know what it’s like. It’s not good. All you have to do is unlock the door for a moment.”

It’s not that Peter doesn’t want to. He just can’t. So he keeps drawing.

“Fucking hell. You’re being insane. Get out of there. ”

He keeps drawing. He’s starting to hate himself a little for making Harley sound so frustrated, so distraught. Old dregs of his Southern accent are starting to appear.

“I’m going out. I have to walk your dog, he’s bouncing off the walls. Please -  _ please _ get out of there. It’s been more than a day and I have to call someone if you don’t.”

Peter draws.

Time passes, he guesses, because Harley and Kobol are out and then they’re back. Peter thinks he must be breaking himself. His back simmers with aches and pains. He can’t see too well any more, which might be from a lack of sleep or a lot of hours of intense focus or both. He’s painting now, but he knows it sucks - but he has to keep going until he gets the idea out of his brain.

_ Click. _

_ They're in the middle of lunch. It’s broad daylight. Neither of them expected Larry to come barrelling in before they’d even finished their soup. _

_ There’s a harsh clank as Tony drops his spoon. _

_ Before Peter can swallow his mouthful, he’s against the wall with Larry all over him. Larry pulling down his pants. Larry slipping his hands under his shirt. Larry starting to thrust into him. _

_ Grunting. _

_ It’s too close and too fast and  _ too much too much too much _ and Peter can’t think or breathe or keep himself upright and he doesn’t know what to do with his hands, he never does, because it’s not like he wants to touch Larry back and he can’t push him away - hardly even considers it any more - so his arms are just hanging at his sides and his vision is spinning with the shock and the terror and the pain of it. And the shame. God - the shame. Tony right there. Tony seeing it all. Tony watching him being broken apart. _

_ Peter had thought it would get easier to go through this. He’d hoped with all his heart that he could get used to it, but he never has. Every time, it’s a new horror. _

_ He hadn’t even noticed that Larry had finished up. He steps away and Peter just drops to the floor. He’s forgotten how to stand. Larry laughs at him. _

_ Click. _

_ Peter’s vision is on a tilt-a-whirl. He can’t keep laying on the floor because Tony is there. _

_ He thinks he hears the shuffle of him getting up, so he scrambles to talk. “Hold on. Don’t - don’t look for a minute.” _

_ “Peter.”  _

_ It’s splintered. _

_ “I’m just gonna… please don’t look.” _

_ He picks himself up and leans against the wall for a moment while he rides out the new pain sparking to life between his legs. God. Larry had been rougher than usual. There's wetness across his bare thighs. _

_ He replaces his boxers and pants and takes a few deep breaths. Then he sits back at the table. Tony had been turned around in his seat to face away from Peter. When he swivels back he looks like he’s just seen the world ending. _

_ Peter tries the soup.  _

_ “It’s cold.” _

You don’t want a memory like that floating around in your mind while you try and talk to people like normal. If Peter doesn’t leave his room until it’s out, it’ll never leave either.

So he paints.

Harley talks sometimes. 

“Baby, please. I want to help you out.”

“You’re putting yourself in danger and you’re making me worried as hell. Come on. This isn’t like you.”   


“Peter, I’m - I’m getting scared now. There, I said it. You’re still conscious in there, aren’t you? Are you?”

“Fuck it. I’m calling Tony. I’m calling him.”

“Wait!” Peter says.

“Oh my God. Oh my  _ God.” _ Harley’s voice gets clearer, as if he’s pressed himself up against the other side of the door. “You’re still there.”   


“Don’t call Tony. I just need to get this done.”   


“Let me in, Pete. You’ve gotta let me in.”

“No. You’re not listening. I have to get the idea out. It’s not safe for you to come in until it’s gone.”

There’s silence. Then, wetly, “It’s alright, Pete. It’s safe. Nothing can hurt you, okay?”

“You don’t understand. Let me finish.”

And it gets darker and then lighter again and Peter thinks he passes out on the floor at one point because why else would he wake up there? But he feels a little better after that and he paints and paints and he  _ finishes. _

It’s of these two fluid figures tangled in one another and one is trying to escape but he’s trapped in the bigger one.

There’s scrabbling at his door which makes him jump. But he knows who would be scrabbling at his door.

He goes over to it - except it takes a while because he really can’t see very well - and sure enough, when he opens it, Kobol is there.

“Hey, boy,” he says. He nudges the dog with his foot but he thinks bending down to stroke him would be a bad idea. Now he’s out in the rest of the world, he wonders what he’s supposed to do. Kobol is everywhere, frantic. 

He didn’t notice Harley was sleeping on the couch but he was because he wakes up fast and says, “Oh, fucking hell,” and trips running over to Peter.

But even though he looks angry, he just hugs Peter. Hugs him a lot, tightly, until Peter forgets how to stay up on his own and it feels a little like in the Room only someone’s holding him this time.  Harley fumbles to grip him tighter. He lowers them both to the floor. He’s got Peter’s head held gently in his hand, not pulling at his hair like Larry usually did. That’s how Peter knows he’s alright.

“Oh, shit, honey,” Harley keeps murmuring. He looks wrecked and Peter feels awful. “God Almighty.”

“Sorry. I had to keep working.”   


“No you didn’t. No you didn’t.” Harley is holding his hands now. He’s smoothing them out so they don’t shake so much. “You know what you are? You’re a world-class silly. I’m gonna get you some goddamn  _ food. _ Have you drunk anything since you went in there?”

Peter thinks. “No.”

“Goddamn you. You can’t do that. No wonder you’re swooning like you’re a woman straight out of a black-and-white.”

“I just needed to get the memory to go away.”

Harley brushes back his greasy hair. “What memory?”

“Bad memory.”

“A Larry memory?”

Peter nods.

“Why’d you think about that?”   


“It made a good painting.”   


“It--” Harley cuts himself off, rocking back on his haunches, looking at the ceiling like it’s got the rest of his sentence written on it. “It  _ made a good painting. _ It made a good  _ painting? _ You’re kidding me. A good painting.  _ Trauma _ made a good painting. You stupid,  _ stupid  _ little man. Let me get you some fucking celery. A good fucking  _ painting. _ Hey - don’t move. Don’t you dare. Not until you’ve had some water.”

“I need to pee.”

“No you don’t. There’s gotta be no water left in you.”

Kobol replaces Harley the moment he’s gone. He can tell that something’s up, so he just lays comfortingly over Peter. It’s really nice. He forgot how much he missed his dog.

“That dog was being almost as stupid as you,” says Harley from the kitchen. “Crying all day and all night. When you’re better, you’re taking him for a whole-ass hike.”

Something drops onto his collarbone. Peter grabs dazedly at it. It’s Bear. Kobol looks at him expectantly. 

“Oh. Thank you, baby.”

The dog is trying to comfort him too. This is what he does. He gives Bear to people when he thinks they need to be cheered up. Mostly Peter. 

Peter blinks. His eyes are dry. They’re dry. He squeezes Bear and Kobol flops back onto him like he’s satisfied that his job is done.

“Harley, what day is it?”

“April the 31st. Wednesday.”   


“Wednesday?”   


“Mm-hm.”

It’s been two days.

“Crap.”   


“Yeah, crap.”

Harley comes back and helps him to sit up against the couch and drink some water and eat some celery like he said, the whole time looking angry and worried and upset.

Peter’s a shit boyfriend.

He wants to be good. He just fell for a while. It’s hard to be good to other people when you’re not even good to yourself.

“You’re great, Harley,” he says quietly.

“I won’t forgive you just because you’re being nice now.”   


“I wasn’t trying to get you to forgive me. It’s just true. You’re good. You’re too good.”   


“What, you want me to be less good?”   


“You’re too good for me.”   


“Come on, shut up. I’m pretty fucked-up too.”

“I’m so sorry,” Peter says. And then he’s thinking about falling from the wall and the pain and wetness between his legs and he can  _ still feel it _ even though that hasn’t happened for years. And he’s crying.

Harley was wrong. There's still water left in him.

He always cries. Harley doesn’t always start crying with him, though.

“I think I need to go to my therapist soon,” he tries to say through snot and tears, through Harley’s shirt as he wraps him up in another hug. 

“I think you do.” Harley’s making the crown of his head damp. “You need to talk to the prof about deadlines. You need to stop working yourself this hard. You - God, you stink like a motherfucker.”

“Yeah.”

* * *

“Tony, before anything else, I just wanted to say that I… had a bad time over the last few days. And I didn’t want you to know about it. I got stuck in my room for a little while, but I’m out and I’m okay and everything’s getting better.”

_ “Hey, what? What happened?” _

“I just got stuck trying to finish a painting.” _   
_

_ “I told you to be careful dredging up the Room for those paintings.” _

“I know. It’s just - they’re better when they’re about the Room.”

_ “Your artistic ability isn’t dependent on your trauma. Okay?” _

“Okay. I just--”

_ “No. Not ‘I just’. You are a good painter, kid, not because of the Room but because you have talent and work hard.” _

“Yeah. Yeah. Thanks.”

_ “You talk to Simone about it?” _ _   
_

“A lot. I kept thinking about that time with the soup, you know?” _   
_

_ “Oh.” _

“You remember it?” _   
_

_ “Uh-huh.” _

“I’m, uh - sorry that you had to--”

_ “Really? Don’t finish that sentence.” _

“I was gonna say that I should have called you.”

_ “You could’ve.” _

“But?”

_ “You dealt with it. In whatever way you did. I would have preferred it if you called, but you’re an adult, kid. You don’t have to any more.” _

“I did deal with it. I just don’t want you to worry or anything.”

_ “I’ll worry no matter what. That’s my problem.” _

* * *

_ May 1st _

He takes Kobol out on that long walk Harley had encouraged him to go on, skipping class for the warming air of the outdoors and the dog’s enthusiastic tugging on the leash. Spring is here, outside Peter and, he thinks, within him too. 

Kobol’s forgiven him, but Peter isn’t sure if he’s forgiven himself. So they have a chat in their favourite place, curled up around each other on the couch, Kobol across Peter’s chest.

“You know, you’re the best dog in the galaxy,” Peter tells him, blowing away stray hairs that come off in his hands as he runs his hands along his fur. "I hope you don’t think I changed my mind about that. I will always love you, and I will always try my best to look after you, even when I’m not doing good. So I’m sorry I made you feel lonely. I think I won’t ever have to do that again.”

Kobol snores happily.

“Yeah, I know you love me back again already. But I wanted to apologize properly so I won’t want to do any of this again. Do you accept my apology, baby boy?”

Kobol aims a lazy kiss at Peter’s face.

“Oh, that’s a definite yes. Thanks. I’m giving you another half hour of cuddles for that.”

Peter returns the kiss wholeheartedly. Stretching his arm for the book he’d discarded a minute ago, he sets it gently on top of Kobol’s back and reads on.

* * *

_ 13th June _

Earbuds in, Kobol sat at his side, and sketchbook open, Peter scans the room around him for someone to draw. The library always has an interesting blend of people in it. Hardcore studiers, book browsers, energy-drink downers, groups of laughing friends hushed by the librarian. 

Peter’s by himself, getting some time alone before coming home to his apartment. He has all he needs for the while: he’s got his 2B and 4B pencils, and he’s found a guy to draw, hunched over a desk.

“Is that your dog?”

Peter startles upright. Someone’s above him.

“Yeah,” he says on instinct. Now he’s broken out of his haze of focus, he notices the girl, tall as anything but smiling delightedly down at Kobol.

Sometimes Peter thinks he should’ve just picked an ugly dog.

“He’s adorable. I know that he’s a support animal, but - would it be alright if I petted him for a second?”

Thankfully, Peter doesn’t have any particular need for Kobol right now, but if it weren’t that way, he’d be more exasperated at yet another person failing to understand how to react to the  _ EMOTIONAL SUPPORT  _ vest.

“Sure. He’s not really on-duty, so you’re alright.”

The girl grins. “Lucky.” Crouching down to Kobol, who’s pretty much always happy to meet someone new, she scratches at his neck and coos in the way people normally do.

“Aren’t you a good dog?” she’s telling Kobol. Kobol just pants happily. Finally, the girl looks up to Peter, a smile still stuck on her face. “He is an absolute  _ sweetheart.” _

_ “Oh, sweetheart. Doesn’t it feel good?” _

Crap. Not now.

Peter nods.

“What’s his name?”

_ “Larry, it’s not--” _

“Kobol.”

_ “It’s alright, sweetheart.” _

“What’s that mean?”

“A planet. From a TV show.”

“A planet?”

“Yup.”

The tall girl gets up, looking at him with a little wince on her face now. “I am so sorry. I kind of butted in here, didn’t I?”

“It’s alright,” Peter says, all the time thinking  _ please go please go please go-- _

_ “I’ve realised something, kiddo. And I’ve gotta say, I’m sorry. I never showed you how to have a good time yourself.” _

“No, it’s not. I’ll - God, I’m still talking, let me just - I’m gonna go.”

Peter suddenly finds that he doesn’t want her to leave.  _ Don’t go. _

“What’s your name?”

She turns back around, hands thrust deep in the pockets of her shorts. Besides that, she’s wearing a loose marbled crop top and a lot of silver jewellry. Her hair is short and choppy. 

“I’m… Ella?”

“You don’t sound too sure,” Peter jokes without thinking.

She ducks her head and laughs. Peter drops his hand towards the floor, trying to be subtle, and Kobol gets the hint. He butts his head into Peter’s fingers.

Ella narrows her eyes and ventures, “Was that an invitation to keep petting the dog?”

“Yeah, I think it was,” Peter tells her honestly.

Huffing out a laugh, Ella says, “Alright.” She pulls up a chair. Peter scribbles a random face onto his paper with one hand, still stroking Kobol with the other. His mind is starting to clear by itself. It’s kind of a miracle. If talking to Ella is what’s doing it, he’s gonna keep talking to her.

“Hey, what’s your degree?” he asks her as she stoops to join him in petting the dog.

“Illustration.”

“That’s awesome!” 

“Thank you! I can show you what I’m working on right now if you’d like? I’m trying out inking, like Charlie Mackesy?  _ The Boy, the Mole, the Fox and the Horse?” _

“I love that style.”   


She’s fished out her phone and now brandishes it under his nose. It’s a young girl with a long plait and skirt blowing in the wind, looking out of the page, searching for something.   


“That’s gorgeous,” he breathes. The inking of the girl takes up residence in the front of his mind and banishes Larry wholeheartedly.

“It’s just a little doodle.”

“I already wanna know what she’s looking for.”

Ella shrugs, but she’s smiling too. “Maybe I’ll think about that. What’s yours?”

“My degree? I’m doing Fine Arts. My art is mostly… a lot more angsty than yours.” He chuckles self-consciously. It’s always strange explaining his Room art. “I paint scenes from a time when I was younger and I was, uh, kidnapped.”

Her jaw drops. She points at him. “You’re - that’s  _ you?  _ You’re Peter Parker?”

“Have you... heard about me?”

Peter’s not exactly a household name, but he’s not invisible either. Word spread about the boy who was kidnapped.

“I have,” she says. “Your art is  _ amazing.” _

“It - oh?”

“Of course - the boy in the paintings looks like you. You are  _ great. _ The way you use shadows and light, oh my God… you can tell it all comes from a really deep place within you. When I saw your work for the first time - I think it was the one with all the hands? - I couldn’t stop thinking about it for, like, an entire day.”

She runs out of steam and then neither of them really know what to say. So they just stroke Kobol for a while longer.

“That’s really cool to hear,” Peter responds eventually. “That’s exactly what I want people to do when they see my art, I guess. Just - think about stuff. Think about themselves and other people more than they might have done before.”

Ella smiles at him and she doesn’t bring up the kidnapping once while they sit there and talk and talk until it gets dark outside the library, which is amazing.  _ She’s _ amazing. 

Did Peter just make a  _ friend? _

When he walks Kobol back home through the dark, he’s not scared of the shadows, nor is he thinking about Larry at all. He’s thinking about Ella, and about the inky girl with the plait.

* * *

_ New Year’s Eve 2024 _

Peter and Harley’s picnic is mostly made of trash, although they manage to make up healthy things once in a while when they dine out here on the flat roof of the Photography department. Today, it’s lot of Sour Patch Kids and Nerds and Sno Balls. Kobol lounges about on Peter’s stomach, draped across their wound-together bodies.

Harley squints up at the stars from under his beanie. “What do you think you’ll do after this?”   


“After SVA?”

Harley nods, looking strangely at Peter.

“Well… I wanna try and make it as an artist.”

“Yeah?” Harley turns to face him more fully.

Should Peter say what he’s really thinking? Because he’s really thinking that he’d like to live with Harley forever and ever and marry him and have lots of babies and dogs and make out with him every day and night.

“And… I guess I want to stay in New York?” he ventures, watching Harley watching him. “Or maybe not?”

This is usually the point where Harley throws out a fondly sarcastic comment and kisses his uncertainty away. But Harley looks more nervous than  _ him. _

Which makes Peter’s heart sink.

He grabs Kobol’s fur.

“What about you?” he murmurs to Harley.

Harley who’s wearing three jumpers under his winter coat because he’s an absolute  _ twig _ and always cold. Harley who’s twined around him shamelessly but still manages to look as shy as he might on a first date. Harley with his stupid curtain-y hair and seashore eyes and his fixation with  _ Stranger Things  _ and his fidgety hands that inexplicably still when they’re around Peter. Harley who’s the most gorgeous mess Peter’s ever laid eyes on. Harley who Peter never wants to take his eyes off.

“Dunno,” he huffs. Then, lifting his eyes for real, he says, “I thought that… you know, if you wanted to, we could…”

“Find a place?” breathes Peter.

The nerves melt away from Harley’s expression.  _ Oh. _

He finds Peter’s hand, easing it away from Kobol and into his. “I - I think it could be… cool.”

“Look at you,” Peter can’t help but croon. “All cute and stuttery. We’ve switched personalities.”

Harley smiles. “Shut up.”

Seeing as he’s being Harley now, Peter decides the best course of action is, of course, to kiss him. So he nudges his forehead into his boyfriend’s, traces his cheek with a hand for a moment, then presses his lips to his.

“Let’s find a place,” he says while they rest in that close, precious post-kiss bliss.

* * *

_ 20th May 2025 _

“Oh my God.”   


“What?”

“It’s just hit me.”

Peter twists around in the mirror, his graduation gown flowing about him. It’s bright red with the yellow SVA logo on each breast, and so is Harley’s. Their caps are waiting on the couch. 

“We’re gonna get degrees.”

Harley hooks his chin over Peter’s shoulder, clasping his hands around Peter’s waist, and watches them both in the reflection.

“Harley.” And for some reason, Peter’s laughing. “We’re gonna fucking  _ graduate.” _

“Yeah, we are,” Harley huffs incredulously back at him.

Peter snorts. “We look stupid.”

“Like first-class dorks. Yup.”

“I’m gonna make a  _ speech.” _

“How are you feeling about that?” Harley asks, beginning to rock them side to side a little.

Peter leans his cheek against his boyfriend’s. “Shit-scared.”

“I can tell. You’re swearing more than me.”

“No, the last shreds of my dignity,” Peter jokes weakly.

“Goddamn.”   


“What?” Turning to face him, Peter studies the sudden blank expanse of his expression.

“We’re gonna  _ graduate.” _

They descend into peals of laughter.

“Oh my God,” says Peter, “I can’t believe all of this. I got to go to a crazy cool art school and I found the best boyfriend ever along the way? How is this even happening?”

“You sap,” Harley teases, but he’s blushing.

And then there’s silence in the apartment for a moment. God, Peter’s gonna miss the apartment.

So he says, “I’ll sure miss the  _ and they were roommates _ stage of our life.”

“Yeah, me too.” Smiling sadly, Harley presses a kiss to Peter’s cheek that warms him to the core. “But hey, it can only get better from here on out, right?”

It’s impossible to tell in reality. But sometimes you just get a feeling about these things, and Peter’s definitely getting feelings.

* * *

A roar of applause accompanies Peter’s walk up to the podium. His vision is hazy from all the lights shining on him, so he can’t really make out how many people are watching him, just a murmuring mass. It’s probably for the best.

Kobol brushes up against his gown. He motions for him to sit, sets out his sheet of notes on the stand, takes a deep breath.

“Man, I didn’t think I’d be up here today,” he says, just being honest, but the audience chuckles.

“No, I really - I did not think that I would make it here today. For a good while, I didn’t think I’d have any sort of life at all. Uh - I don’t intend to put a damper on this joyful day, but I’m gonna talk about some sad stuff for a while now, and I’m gonna talk about myself. But don’t worry, I’m not totally self-centred. My point will come!”

A laugh from the audience. He breaks out into a laugh with them.

“Some of you… some of you may know that I was kidnapped at the age of twelve. My captor took me from the streets of New York as I walked home from school and locked me in a twelve-by-twelve foot room. I spent four years of my life in that room. It was devastating for me. I suffered constant abuse from my captor, and I watched Tony suffer too: Tony Stark, the man who went through it all with me.”

Quiet. A sincere quiet, not awkward.

“We had our fair share of fights - you can imagine how much more irritating someone can be when you’re stuck in a confined space with them - but... he taught me to cook. He got me interested in getting up and watching TV when all I wanted to do was lay in bed. He kept smiling for me when life felt unliveable for us both. He encouraged me to keep drawing with whatever resources we could scrounge up, although I was certain I’d never be able to show my work to another soul, and - look where I am now, right?”

He hadn’t expected a cheer to rise in the crowd. He smiles unwittingly.

“He was  _ always _ there for me. Whether I clung to him or pushed him away, he’d have his arms open for me to fall into. We began as strangers, but ended up as family.” Off the cuff, he adds, “He’s actually - my dad now. Which is cool.”

Another, louder cheer. Peter swears he can hear Ned hollering somewhere. “Thanks, guys,” he grins. The audience is coming into focus, thousands and thousands of graduands and family and friends. 

“Tony said not to talk about him in the speech. Sorry, Tony. Um. Wow. There are a  _ lot  _ of people here. Look at you all! I feel so proud of all of you.”

More cheering. Peter’s heart is flipping happily.

“Back to the speech, back to the speech!” he cries. The room laughs, then turns its focus back to him. 

“After being rescued from the Room, it was just me and Tony for a while, holed up in a hospital room. I’d come out of the foster system, so there was no family to greet me. That’s when Pepper and Rhodey burst in. That young, frightened, hurting version of me didn’t know then that his family was about to get bigger.

“Since then, my family has only grown. Coming to SVA has given me a family I could have only dreamed about a few years ago. Family is important to SVA, and it shows. The staff have guided us through these years with skill, wisdom and care. They have drawn our best art from the most sincere depths of ourselves. And the friends we’ve made will, I hope, be people we know for years to come. Friends we can call family.”

_ Bark! _

Kobol is pawing at his gown, tongue lolling. Peter can’t be mad at him, especially given the collective sigh of endearment that comes from the audience.

“Oh. I think he wants a mention.” Peter’s totally improvising. He’s not even scared anymore. He lugs Kobol into his arms, then stands back up to talk into the mic. “Kobol, my dog!”

_ Bark bark! _

“Always stealing the show.”

Peter can make out some of the closest faces in the auditorium, and on them are big smiles. 

“He’s a big part of my family. I hope you all find the cats and dogs of your dreams, folks. And I hope it wasn’t too weird that I just said that.” He loses himself to his own laugh for a moment, and some audience members laugh with him. Someone whoops, long and loud and high-pitched, someone Peter doesn’t recognise. Probably a pet lover.

“So, what is family? Family is the people who smile for you even when it’s tough. Who have their arms open for you when you fall. Who get you to places you never believed you’d get to with their support. I’m sure we all must have felt a little like that sixteen-year-old Peter as freshmen - I know I did. Pretty young, pretty uncertain, and very scared. Not knowing what the future would hold. Well, this is it. Whatever is now behind us, we’re here. At last, we are here.

“I didn’t think that I’d be here today, but thanks to the open arms of my family, I have made it. We have all made it. We’ve graduated.”

Silence for a moment. Peter freezes.  _ Wait, what if that was awful? _

Then, building from the back of the room, comes a deafening roar of applause.

Peter bundles Kobol back up into his arms and lets loose his relief. “Thank you,” he calls into the mic as an afterthought.

He steps back towards his seat in the audience with his legs shaking from the dregs of his adrenaline rush but his heart light as anything.

* * *

_ 30th September 2027 _

The streets of New York hum. That’s what Peter loves most about them. The concrete floor here is hot and dusty and gum-covered, printed with the marks of countless other people. The sky is a blue slit torn into the brownstone street. Cars make a racket. Somehow, it quietens Peter on the inside.

Kobol’s fur has taken on a warm tinge from the sinking sun. He looks pretty gorgeous, but Peter thinks he always looks gorgeous. He’s particularly agreeable now Peter does all his work from home. Harley’s often out putting films together, but Peter’s happy to spend his day painting in his attic. He gets a walk every day taking Kobol out. What could be better?

His phone buzzes in his pocket.

“Hello?”

_ “Is this Peter Parker?” _

“Yeah, it is.”

_ “I’m calling on behalf of the Arcadia Contemporary Art Gallery.” _

Peter stops in his tracks. “The Arcadia?”

_ “We’ve been reviewing work to include in our most recent collection, as you may know…” _

Kobol has trotted back up to him, cocking his head inquisitively as he flaps his free hand about. What else is he supposed to do?  _ Oh my god no way no way _ he mouths down at his dog.

_ “And I'd just like to confirm that your work will feature in a room in our exhibition.” _

“A - a  _ room? _ A whole room?” 

Peter had tried to sound nonchalant, but a little of his euphoria definitely leaked into his remark if the short burst of laughter from the caller is anything to go by.  _ “Yes, a whole room. The adjudicators were very taken by your artwork.” _

“Oh wow.” Thankfully, it’s New York; nobody bats an eyelid at the man freaking out on the sidewalk. Kobol takes on Peter’s excitement, though, turning in frenzied circles. Peter beams down at him. “This is amazing. Thank you so much.”

_ “No need to thank me,”  _ the caller replies mildly.  _ “We’ll be in touch again soon to discuss getting your background information for the exhibition, methods of payment, et cetera…” _

“That sounds great. Awesome.”

_ “Awesome. I hope you have a good day, Mr. Parker.” _

“You too. Thanks again.”

And the call disconnects.

Kobol puts his paws up on Peter’s legs. Peter runs his hands through his coat, trying to process what the hell just happened.

“The Arcadia. I’m gonna be in the  _ Arcadia.” _

_ Bark! _

Unable to hold his elation within himself any more, Peter breaks out into a run along the sidewalk, Kobol jumping to follow him. He weaves through crowds of oblivious people. People who have no idea that he’s actually making it as an artist. People who might see his art in passing as they walk through the Arcadia Contemporary.

Peter’s running on weightless feet. He laughs.

He’s gotta tell Harley! Still jogging, not quite knowing where he’s headed, he fishes out his phone again and--

It buzzes.

“Pepper?”

_ “Peter.” _

“Hi! Perfect timing! I have something amazing to tell you. I got a call back from--”   


_ “Peter, Tony’s in hospital.” _

“What?”

Someone bumps into him as he stops for the second time during the walk.

_ “He’s… he’s really sick. Meningitis, they think. He didn’t want to worry you when we were at home, but I thought you should know now.” _

“Meningitis.”

_ “They’re still figuring it out. They’ve done a lumbar puncture into his spinal fluid to diagnose it. He’s vomiting and losing his vision and burning up and - Peter, he's forgetting where he is. He keeps talking about you and Larry and the Room. I think you should come.” _

“I’m coming.” Peter’s already starting to run again, in the opposite direction, back to his apartment, Kobol hot on his heels, his heart pounding not from the exercise but from pure panic.

It’s a familiar panic. The helpless terror of watching your dad in pain.

“I’ll be with you in half an hour.”

It’s almost like an old friend.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> okay idk how being an artist works so i made up this gallery exchange.... the arcadia contemporary is the real name of a gallery though!!   
> uh,,,, sorry about the angst? you may have forgotten that i am a tyrannical god who likes to hurt my favourite characters, so here's your reminder!  
> today's unrelated fun news: our family just bought an electric car and it's gonna be the car that i learn to drive in which is great because it's super easy!!! i can't wait to start driving fjfndsjfhfd i can get a provisional license really soon so i can go out and learn to make it stop and start and stuff! how are you guys at driving if you do drive? and if you don't are you excited or scared to learn?


	4. The end, my friend

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TRIGGER WARNING: major character death.  
> yeah ik. uh

“C’mon, K,” Harley pleads yet again, “sit with me.”

Kobol can’t just now. He knows something’s wrong with Peter. He could smell the sudden worry on him as they ran back to the apartment. There are lots of different types of running. Peter ran happily, then he ran urgently. Kobol ran with him. And then he was left alone, the worst. Now Harley is here, which is better, but he’s not Peter. And something’s wrong with Peter. So he wants to find Peter.

Peter’s practically always at home nowadays. Sometimes he goes to the big concrete building on 5th avenue and dances in a room with a wall of mirrors or punches bags and lifts heavy things on the ground level. Kobol's allowed there and he knows some of the guys who do punching and lifting at the same time as Peter, who look intimidating but stroke him really politely, it turns out. Kobol likes to wander around the apartment while Peter’s up at the top making pictures on the big white sheets, knowing he’s safe and happy. That’s all he wants. Peter safe and happy. But Peter’s not here. And something’s wrong with Peter.

Unsure of how to fix any of this, Kobol just paws at the ground. Digging is comforting. He woofs for good measure.

Harley runs his hands through his hair in the way humans do when they’re upset, like they’re petting themself. Kobol knows it calms him down to have people pet him. 

“Why do you gotta be so goddamn smart?” he mutters in his direction.

Kobol tilts his head.

“Yeah? Are you listening? Peter’s gone to the hospital to look after Tony. No dogs allowed there. So it’s just you and me for now.”

Kobol tries to understand the things the humans say, but mostly it doesn’t sound that important. He hears _Peter,_ but Peter doesn’t appear. He doesn’t think Peter will come for a while, though.

Harley’s getting up now. He sits down by where Kobol’s still digging into the floor half-heartedly and tugs him into his lap.

Well, that’s pretty nice. Harley’s no Peter, but he’s nice to cuddle. Always gentle - gentler than he is with himself, actually, gentler than when he drags combs through his hair and bites his nails to the quick and scrubs his face with his hand and sits all hunched over at a screen playing snatches of people talking over and over again. 

“There you go, fuzzball,” Harley says. The tone is soft, so Kobol thinks he’s being nice. 

He rests his forehead against Kobol’s side. “I know you just wanna help Pete. I wanna do that too. But this is about him and his family. You and me, we don’t have family like that. I hate to break it to you, buddy, but you’re adopted. And I’ve… I’ve got nobody really special. Nobody who doesn’t wish I was less gay.”

He snorts, which usually means the person is laughing, but Kobol’s also learnt that humans laugh when they’re not so happy too.

“Ah, Christ.”

Kobol licks his face at that. Harley mostly says _Christ_ when he’s trying not to be upset. He gets a smile for his efforts.

“Yeah, yeah. You’re always trying to cheer up the nearest sad person. It’s not always that easy, K. You can’t cuddle away bereavement. God, I hope it won’t come to that.”

Kobol doesn’t know what he’s talking about, but he knows that Harley’s still stressed, so he butts his head into his hand to get him to stroke him.

Harley gives him a kiss on the crown of his head. They sit there for a long while, but Harley doesn’t get better.

* * *

Peter’s in a hospital yet again. He feels like his life is slowly devolving into a season of ER. Ha, ha. Not funny. 

He finds the room and walks in and-- 

\--and has to blink away the Tony of seven years ago who sat up through the pain of multiple stab wounds and gathered Peter into his arms. Beneath the memory, he finds something worse.

Tony’s covered in tubes and wires and electrodes. His heart monitor beeps erratically. Sat close to his face is Pepper, holding his hand, talking soothingly. It doesn’t look like her words are doing much to smooth the deep lines in his face which make him look decades older than his fifty-two years.

Pepper hears him come in and watches him, her plastered-on smile wobbling. Peter gives her one back.

Pulling up a chair, Peter sits by his dad. Pepper shuffles away to let him have a moment.

"Hey, old man,” he murmurs, replacing Pepper’s hand with his around Tony’s. “How are you feeling?"

He doesn’t think Tony’s quite aware who’s talking to him. His eyes are half-lidded and vacant. He just grunts. "Sore."

"I bet." Peter puts his other hand over Tony’s, clasping it now within both of his own, enclosing his heavy fingers.

Then Tony tenses up.

He looks right at Peter and says, "He got me bad, kid.”

Peter turns around to Pepper.

"This is what I was talking about,” she says. “The doctors say delirium is just another symptom." 

"I hear the door, Pete,” says Tony groggily but urgently, making Peter turn back to him. “Get behind me.”

There’s real panic in his voice.

Peter sees the hospital bed and the monitor and the sheen of sweat across Tony’s forehead, so he says, "It's okay. You're--" 

"I know, it's useless."

Peter’s vision blurs.

He gets in really close, close enough to rest his cheek against Tony’s pillow, hoping it will help Tony see that Peter isn’t sixteen but twenty-three, isn’t in the Room but trying to break him out of it.

"Tony. You're in a hospital. You are _safe._ You're feeling sick, alright? But we're out of the Room." 

Looking right through Peter and into the past, Tony whispers, "Don't wanna hear him do that to you again."

_Tony right there. Tony seeing it all. Tony watching him being broken apart._

And _fuck,_ because Peter’s never quite forgiven himself for what Tony had to witness.

"You're not really hearing it,” he blurts. Anything to bring him back. “It's your head tricking you. It'll go quiet soon, Tony. I'm gonna be with you the whole time until it does." 

"Can you clean the stains for me?" croaks Tony.

_“Good. Good job. Go to sleep, I can… I’ll take care of myself. I’ll clean up later.”_

_Peter’s gaze darts to the bloodstains on the floor at the reminder. “No, I can do it. I wanna.”_

_Struck with a sudden pang, Tony reaches for his hand, squeezes it tight. “Good kid,” he manages, injecting as much sincerity as he can into the praise. “Such an… amazing kid.”_

Peter wonders if this is even a little like how it felt for Tony to have to comfort Peter through the endless horrors of the Room.

Not knowing how else to respond, he just squeezes Tony’s hand and says, "I'll clean up. Don't worry." 

"Cheerios?" 

Peter bites the inside of his lip hard.

"Yeah. When you're feeling better, I'll get you some Cheerios."

Tony seems satisfied at that. He closes his eyes. Peter leans back in his chair, drying his eyes. Man, it _hurts_ to shed these tears.

But Tony’s still got things to say - always did, and always will, it seems. His voice a little less slurred, a little louder, he remarks, "God, he fucked up my neck.”

"No, meningitis fucked it up,” Peter tells him gently. “A stiff neck, that’s one of the symptoms.”

"Meningitis?"

 _Thank God,_ Peter thinks. He’s finally lucid.

"They're finding out how serious it is right now.”

Blinking, groaning, then blinking once again, Tony finally looks over at him and really sees him. "Peter?"

Peter exhales all in a rush.

“Dad?” he breathes.

He doesn’t often say it, but he feels that he needs to right now.

“Kid,” Tony affirms.

Peter’s so relieved, he brings Tony’s hand up to his face and presses it to his lips.

Tony’s not so relieved. Somehow, he finds the wherewithal to look affronted. "Pep? Why'd you tell him?"

"Tony, you were seizing,” she says. “We want to be with you, honey." 

"Not like this." 

Not wanting to think about what that really means, Peter pulls a face at him. "Hey, quit the grumpy grandpa act. Just 'cause you've got a crazy disease, doesn't mean you've gotta be all dramatic about it." 

It feels like the strained banter they flung back and forth at one another years ago, trying not to think about the confines of a twelve-by-twelve-foot space. Maybe that’s why, although Tony laughs, it sounds pained.

Peter loses his grip on himself for a moment. "It hurts, huh?" he whispers.

Tony sighs.

Peter leans towards him and kisses his temple. Then he leaves for a minute.

* * *

A hand on Peter’s back makes him jump. Looking up into the mirror he’s hunched over, he sees Rhodey behind him, silently rubbing circles into the back of his t-shirt. It doesn’t ease the million knots there, but it’s warm and compassionate.

Tapping his fingers against the bathroom sink he’s got held in a death grip, Peter feels the bones at their tips strike the porcelain. 

“Are we supposed to pray?” he asks Rhodey.

Still, silence.

Eventually, Rhodey says to him, “I’ve prayed.”

“Do you pray?”

“Not really. Not well.”

But he did anyway. So, watching himself in the mirror, Peter says, “Should I pray?”

“If you want.” Rhodey’s watching him watching himself. He’s always been pretty much unreadable to Peter. He can see the grief piling up at his edges now, though, and his desperate hope that it will die before it sees use.

Peter can’t find the strength to straighten up yet. Ducking his head now to the dirty plughole, he tries to find fitting words. “God…”

One of his paintings comes into his thoughts, an image of Tony sprawled on a bright white concrete floor, blood everywhere, and yet a haze of pale yellow around his head that Peter hadn’t questioned at the time but as he studied the finished thing became more and more similar to a turbulent kind of halo.

“Please,” he gasps. “Please. Don’t take him away yet. _Please.”_

* * *

They get back in the room to find Pepper sobbing in her chair.

“What? Pepper, what?”

She tries to draw in a breath. The moment of silence is brief, but it’s still too long for Peter. Tony is still napping on the bed. He’s frail.

“The… the nurse came back while you two were gone. It’s just viral. There’s less than a ten percent chance of mortality.”

Peter falls into her arms and stays there for a long time.

* * *

_11th June 2029_

Cufflinks are a curse straight from Hell.

“Hey,” Ned says, batting his twisting hands away. “These are basically impossible by yourself. Don’t pass out over cufflinks.”

Today is Peter’s literal wedding day and he didn’t know that.

“You’ve never used these for prom or anything?” Ned says in passing.

“Didn’t go to prom,” Peter sighs.

“Oh. Yeah. Sorry, man.”

“It’s cool.”

“These are just plain,” Ned says. 

He snaps his mouth shut right after he says it.

“You can get cufflinks with things on them?”

“Most people do. For weddings, a lot of people get them personalised.”

“They do?”

He didn’t know that. He didn’t - he’s already fucked up the cufflinks. Great. Bodes really well for the actual altar stuff.

God, Harley’s probably gonna leave him at the altar, isn’t he? He’ll see the boring cufflinks and think, _nope._

“Not everyone,” Ned rushes to say, but he’s just trying to get Peter to feel better. “And mostly the personalised ones are, you know, really stupid and sappy. Like, Lucinda Sans handwriting and--”

“Stupid and sappy is what I _want,”_ Peter cries.

Ella comes in to save the day with rationality and a tub of hair gel, which is a particular godsend because most of the time when Peter freaks out she just freaks out with him. “Can I swoop in here and style you, Pete?”

“Please.”

Looping her arms around him from behind, she halts his panic for a moment. “You’ll be just fine. Everyone feels a little batshit on the big day, right?”

“Right,” Peter says, disagreeing with her in his mind. Not everyone feels _this_ batshit.

She’s got a really pretty dress on, reaching her shins like an old-fashioned tea dress, lilac and made of chiffon and fitted around her torso but floating around her legs.

Peter starts to jiggle his leg in the styling chair.

Ella _tsks._ “Don’t, with the leg.”

Peter stops.

He zones out for a bit.

“Have you picked up Harley’s stims or something?”

 _Harley_ brings him back to the present. “Hm?”

“The leg.”

“Sorry.”

Does Harley feel this antsy right now?

Peter thought he knew everything about the wedding. He picked suits, he picked this outdoor tree-framed location by a lake, he and Harley chose the cake and the guests and the wedding party and the reception and the rings - they even got Rhodey to apply to be a wedding officiant so he could marry them because it was a _wacky, crazy, awesome_ idea - but it transpires that he knows _nothing._ Nothing about the actual doing of the thing.

Ella holds his head still to weave flowers into his hair, blue baby’s breath and lilac carnations, which were another product of his and Harley’s middle-of-the-night wedding whims. 

Peter feels like a world-class doofus. A dumbass.

“Are they too much?” he asks Ella.

“No. They’re amazing. They’re perfect. Don’t doubt the flowers.”

Peter’s totally doubting the flowers. But he holds his leg still until she finishes teasing his hair into a style that’s smart but still rests in his natural waves. It looks really nice. Somehow, that makes Peter feel worse.

The door to the little cabin they’ve commandeered to prepare him in opens, and Peter hears Ella mutter under her breath, “Thank fuck.”

It’s Tony. He stops dead in the doorway as Peter stands from his chair, tugging at his cuffs to make them sit right over the cufflinks.

“Oh my God.” Tony walks over to him then stops again, holding his shoulders and looking and looking at him. “Oh my God. Oh my _God.”_

Maybe the dark powder blue suit was too much.

“Do I look that bad?” he says, letting some of his honest amusement leak into the remark.

Tony holds the side of his face. 

Oh. Emotions. 

“You look incredible. Look at you, kid.”

Peter reddens. “Are the flowers weird?”

“Not weird. Gorgeous. You look like - like some spirit that’s come straight out of a meadow. Or someone at the Met Gala. But who’s wearing something really nice, not one of the crazy ones.”

There’s nothing to do but laugh.

Still gripping his shoulders groundingly, Tony asks the question that breaks the dam. “Feeling alright?”

Over his shoulder, Peter catches Ella and Ned studiously ignoring their conversation. Still, he can only shrug. “Eh,” he says articulately.

Tony catches his drift. “That good, huh?”

“We’re gonna go check on Harley,” Ned says loudly.

Peter nods. “Tell him I’m fine,” he blurts as they duck out of the cabin.

Then it’s just him and Tony.

There’s a couch in the corner of the room, and Tony takes Peter there and gets him to sit down. Peter kind of wants to curl up in a ball like when he was a teenager and leech off of Tony’s warmth until he forgets his anxiety, but he’s got a nice suit on and stupid flowers in his hair and he doesn’t want to mess them up because then everything would _definitely_ head for disaster.

“So,” Tony prompts. “Spill.”

“I’m just nervous.”

All Tony does is raise one eyebrow.

“Okay, I’m petrified. Because what if I made a mistake? What if I’m tying him to me when all it’s gonna do is make his life hell? He’s already gotta pick up after me like I’m a toddler. I - I don’t wanna do that to him. He doesn’t deserve that.”

“Yeah, he doesn’t.”

Peter stops. His head is in his hands, but he glances up through his fingers at Tony’s resolute face.

“He deserves a mature, loving husband.”

“...yes?”

“Which is exactly what you are.”

Peter’s taken aback. He flops back onto the couch, silent.

“Kid, you’re really in love with that guy, in case you can’t tell.”

“I can tell,” Peter grumbles at him. “Doesn’t make me good for him.”

“Are you serious? You’ve been together for - what, six years?”

Peter shrugs. “Five and a half.”

At that, Tony shoots him a pointed look. “You watch all the weird artsy films he likes. You lug around his equipment when he’s on one of his crazy quests to get the perfect shot. You support him through his binges and encourage him in his withdrawals. You’ve modelled toys for him to fidget with. And, if that wasn’t enough already, you two have such niche inside jokes that you start laughing just _looking_ at each other.”

Leg bouncing again, Peter says, “I try.”

“Damn right. You _try._ Harley can’t expect you to be perfect and whole and untouched by trauma, and you can’t expect that from yourself either. That’s bullshit. Plus, _you_ don’t expect that of _him,_ do you?”

Well, shit. He’s got a point. 

“What’s _not_ bullshit is trying, and fixing whatever you mess up. Because you _will_ mess up. Marriages are messy. But you two are special.”

The door opens and allows in Pepper. Noticing that Tony’s doing one of his Big Talks, she slides quietly onto the couch at Peter’s other side and takes his hand. It makes Peter’s heart grow in strength a little.

“You understand each other _because_ you are messy,” Tony goes on. “That’s cool, right?”

Peter feels about twelve years old as he waves a hand about and mutters, “That’s cool.”

“This is a beautiful day,” Pepper weighs in, evidently sensing Peter's anxiety. “All you need to worry about today is not tripping down the aisle.”

Tony snorts. “Which you did.”

“Which I did,” Pepper concurs with an embarrassed smile.

“You did?” Peter asks.

“It was a bit of a ridiculous dress, to my credit. I managed to pull my father down with me.” She pauses to snigger elegantly. “But - the point is, Tony and I turned out alright, didn’t we?”

Glancing over at them both, bracketing him, supporting him, Peter smiles. “Yeah, you did.”

“Thank God,” Tony remarks. “Thought I’d never get a smile out of you, Pete.”

“Sorry?”

“No. No _sorry_ s on your wedding day.”

And there it is. Peter can’t believe he’s getting _married._ Wow.

Ned and Ella come back in, announcing that it’s time to get outside and start the procession, and a wild tangle of emotions rises in Peter’s chest, a big mess of good and bad. But he’s gonna get married to Harley. That can’t be bad.

Just as they’re leaving, MJ sticks her head in.

“Hmm,” she says as she appraises Peter. “I like Harley’s suit better.”

Peter laughs, caught off guard, and bundles her into a hug.

“No, I’m kidding,” she adds, smiling against his shoulder. “You look incredible. I dig the mystical gay look. Not enough boys put flowers in their hair.”

“You like the flowers?”

“The flowers are the best part.”

“Hey, I’m… I’m so glad we’re still friends.”

She pulls away a little. “We don’t have to do this now.”

“No, I just wanted to - I wanted to say that I really value this. That we don’t have to hate each other because we’re exes. That you’re still supporting me while I… you know.”

She eyes him. “I’m glad we’re still friends too,” she says eventually.

After she’s ducked out again, it’s just Peter, Tony and Pepper. They squeeze him into as tight a hug possible without squashing his flowers.

“Are you ready?” Pepper asks him.

Peter inhales, exhales. He looks down at the powder blue suit.

He likes it, actually.

“Yeah.”

He’s seen the venue before, but it’s more beautiful than ever with the late-morning sun breaking through the drooping leaves of the two willow trees that frame the archway where Peter will exchange vows with Harley. The lake beyond it glints and ripples. Their small group of guests is seated and ready, beginning to turn around to watch the first members of the procession go down the aisle. Ella, Ned, MJ, and Vincent, Harley’s college friend, are far ahead, Ella in her dress and MJ and the boys in matching tuxes. Then - his stomach lurches - Harley behind them, his light grey suit making him look like Prince Charming and the flowers woven into his hair like an angel. He’s arm-in-arm with his sister. Peter can’t wait to see his face.

Suddenly, this wedding gets a whole lot more exciting.

And, just as Peter thought he couldn’t be more in love with the man being walked down the aisle a ways in front of him, a song begins to fade in.

Harley had kept this song secret. Peter hadn’t thought on it until just now, as he hears it, gets closer to it, recognizes it--

That distinctive male voice. The slow, gentle beat. A three-part harmony fading in.

_You've expressed explicitly your contempt for matrimony_

_You've student loans to pay and will not risk the alimony_

_We spend our days locked in a room content inside a bubble_

_And in the night time we go out and scour the streets for trouble..._

Peter bursts out laughing. He’s beaming. He remembers.

_Hey, hey, marry me, Archie..._

_Hey, hey, marry me, Archie..._

_“What’s this?”_

_Harley shrugs. “Spotify suggested it.”_

_“It’s beautiful,” Peter remarks._

_Harley stops to really listen to it for a moment, then says, “Yeah. It’s something.”_

_A month later, Peter gets home from the store to find their apartment full of candles. Amid them all is Harley, nervously eyeing the trail of dripping wax from one of the tapers on the windowsill, in an honest-to-god shirt and tie._

_Peter drops his shopping bags._

_Harley just grins at him sheepishly._

_“How much did you spend on all these candles?” Peter says faintly._

_Harley looks away and murmurs a worryingly long number._

_Peter runs to him and crashes into his arms, grabbing fistfuls of his already-crumpled shirt. “Harls. Harley.”_

_“It’s not an important day or anything,” Harley says close to Peter’s ear, “But I wanted to just… make it important anyway. Because… well, because - you’re actually a pretty alright guy, if you didn’t know.”_

_“Pretty alright?” chuckles Peter. Sometimes Harley gets like this._

_“Okay, shut up. I actually - like you a bit.”_

_“Hm. Okay. I’m sure feeling ‘liked’ right now.”_

_“I love you. I’m pretty in love with you.”_

_“Oh my God,” Peter whispers, “How embarrassing for you.”_

_Harley lets out a sound halfway between a sigh and a giggle. “I was gonna do another thing, but you kind of spoiled it, Parker.”_

_“No, I didn’t. Do it now. I want a surprise.”_

_And Harley steps back for a moment and touches something on his phone and there it is._

_Marry me, Archie…_

_“This…” Peter doesn’t know what to think. He can feel himself turning crimson. Harley’s just standing. Is he gonna get on his knees? “This isn’t…?”_

_Harley’s jaw drops. “Oh. It’s - no. I didn’t even think… shit, I am_ stupid. _I was just gonna, um…”_

_Grasping Peter’s hand, he pulls him all at once into his chest, adjusting Peter’s arms so they’re--_

_They’re slow dancing._

_“Oh,” Peter says. It’s all either of them can say for a little while. But after the shock of the last few moments blows over, it starts to get - really beautiful._

_Harley’s close, gentle, guiding Peter along._

_“Where’d you learn how to slow dance?”_

_“On YouTube,” murmurs Harley._

_Peter cackles under his breath._

_Harley’s got one hand around Peter’s back, around his stinky old hoodie he’s worn for three days, just gracing his fingers up and down the ridges of his spine beneath the fabric. Their hands are clasped. Peter lets his head fall forward to rest on Harley’s shoulder. It just feels like the right place to be. The tendons of Harley’s shoulder shift beneath his forehead._

_“‘s my first real dance,” he admits to Harley._

_“I know.”_

_Peter’s always wanted to dance._

_Years later, they’re walking Kobol in the park but Harley asks to sit down._

_“Feeling alright?” Peter asks him. Harley never likes to stop while they’re on a walk. He doesn’t even like to wait for Kobol to finish peeing. And sure enough, Harley’s looking pale and sweaty and like he could keel over in a second. Peter kicks himself for failing to notice._

_“Yeah, I’m fine,” rushes Harley, but he’s fidgeting and fidgeting._

_Often, he fights against any allegation of illness until he really does keel over. Peter’s there to make sure that doesn’t happen._

_“No, Harls, you don’t look great.” Kneeling down in front of him where he sits huddled on the bench, he presses the back of his hand to his forehead. “You don’t feel too warm… are you dizzy?”_

_But Harley’s not paying attention to him. He’s staring down at him with a look of unbridled horror._

_“This isn’t how it was supposed to go,” he says._

_What on earth?_

_But before Peter can ask him what the hell the matter is, he holds up a trembling finger to signal Peter to wait. With his other hand, he fishes around in his pocket._

_He gets out his phone and taps the screen and there it is._

_Marry me, Archie…_

_Peter laughs without thinking. “What, are we gonna do another impromptu slow dance here?”_

_Harley just shakes his head vehemently._

_“Baby, you’re making no sense. What is going--”_

_There’s something else that Harley fishes out of his pocket next. Something small and square and velvet-lined._

_Peter falls back on his butt, stunned._

_Marry me, Archie…_

_“Should we switch places or something?” Harley asks him, that sheepish grin appearing on his face, fraught this time with a good helping of existential terror._

_“There - there is a ring in there, isn’t there?” Peter whispers, still unable to compute all this. “You haven’t opened it.”_

_Harley hesitates. His hand is shaking a ridiculous amount around the box. “We should, like - prepare ourselves.”_

_“I can’t prepare myself for this,” Peter says to him, and then--_

_Yep. Then he’s crying._

_If Harley could possibly look more panicked, he does now. “Uh oh. You’re - is that bad crying? Should I - I’ll just--”_

_He opens the box. The ring is silver and delicate and gorgeous. Peter bawls at it._ _  
_

_Harley gets on his knees himself and grasps his shoulders. Kobol paws his way between them, so they’re all clumped together in a crying mess on the ground. People are staring at them as they walk by, doing normal people things._

_“Was that bad?” he questions Peter frantically. “Was it - should I wait longer? Or were you thinking of, like, a committed co-habitation thing without marriage?”_

_“Put the ring on me,” Peter sobs._

_“What?”_

_“Put it on._ Yes. _I say yes. Let’s get fucking married.”_

_Kobol howls as if cheering for them._

_All the tension drains from Harley’s body in a single instant, so rapidly Peter wonders if he really will keel over after all, but he bursts into tears too._

_“Here,” he sniffs, jamming the ring onto Peter’s pinky by accident. Peter fixes it quickly, still crying, the both of them crying._

_A foreign hand lands on Peter’s shoulder._

_“Are you both alright?” asks a voice that’s kindly and half-concerned, half-amused. Peter can’t see them through his tears._ _  
_

_“He’s good,” Harley manages. “We’re getting married.”_

_Peter has the presence of mind to wave the ring in the direction of the voice._

_“Oh! Oh my God! That’s wonderful!”_

_All Peter can do is nod through his tumult of euphoria. Harley kisses his cheek out of nowhere, filling him up so intensely with love that he might burst._

_“Thank you, ma’am,” Peter sobs as the voice offers her congratulations then moves on._

_“I can’t believe you just - proposed,” he says to Harley. “Like that. You’re something, Keener.”_

_“I think I had a heart attack,” Harley replies. “It all went to shit.”_

_Peter pulls him into a fierce hug. “It went perfectly.”_

It’s only when Tony tugs gently at his arm that Peter realises he's started to speed-walk down the aisle to get to Harley. “It’s a procession, kid, not a sprint,” he chuckles.

Harley turns at the altar, and _there he is._ He catches Peter’s eye. Peter beams at him like a lunatic.

Now Peter’s reaching the archway too; Tony and Pepper kiss him on the cheek and step back. Kobol is off to the side, watched over by Ella. He’s wearing a blue bow tie that makes him look utterly adorable. 

Peter wonders now why he was ever scared about this wedding before.

“You look stunning, baby,” Harley whispers to him as he reaches his side. The baby’s breath in his hair brings out his eyes and _God Almighty, he’s heavenly._

All Peter can say to him is, “The _song.”_

He’s so damn excited by it all, especially the devilish smile that blooms across Harley’s face just then, that he rushes towards him and makes to kiss him right then and there.

But Harley holds him away a few inches, shaking with silent laughter, and says, “Not yet, Pete.”

Peter butts his head against Harley’s shoulder, snorting himself.

When, at last, the vows and the rings have been exchanged and Rhodey tells them, “Grooms, you may now kiss,” Peter is all too relieved. He seals his lips to Harley’s and the congregation erupts into cheers.

Peter is so lucky. He’s _so lucky._

And he kisses Harley. And he kisses Harley. And he--

“...and you may now stop kissing, please,” Rhodey interjects, “So we can have lunch.”

Peter and Harley explode into laughter.

* * *

_19th January 2033_

Burnt sienna. Lots of burnt sienna. Burnt umber, too, next to it. Ultramarine and cerulean blue. Titanium white. A little raw umber, but not a lot. Yellow ochre and cadmium yellow and cadmium red. Alizarin crimson for the crackling edges of the morning sky as they ease apart into dawn. Softer, sepia-tinted rays blanket the rise-and-falling tangle of Harley, Kobol and Juliet on the couch, the litter-strewn coffee table, the empty spot where Peter spent the last few hours tangled up with them.

Peter scoots his easel to the doorway of the room, dips his brush into water, mixes up the shadowed blue of the living room, and starts to breathe life into his canvas.

The three of them look caught in the past, in a time before they’ve become so wearied by life. That’s why Peter was drawn to paint them. Maybe it’s the morning sunlight that does it, maybe sleep. Harley could be eighteen again, gawky and grinning and gesturing with his hands all the time, pretending he didn’t have a million personal crushing weights to bear, and not the man of twenty-nine Peter’s spent four years married to. Juliet - well, Juliet has bucketloads more trauma than even Peter and Harley know of after a year of being her parents, more than any ten-year-old should have, and hides it with quiet sulkiness and an unforgiving curtain of hair. But right now, her arms are tight around Kobol and her head is tucked into Harley's chest and her expression is soft. Peter hopes she's dreaming of something good.

Kobol is more weary than he used to be, less of a whirl of energy, less bright-eyed and skittering. He's got a charming old-dog wisdom to him, Peter thinks. He tries to paint that.

He tries to paint this moment, full of so much meaning and so much tenderness, and tries to catch it in time forever. 

He thinks he does an alright job.

Soon, his family will wake. For now, he'll watch dust mites dancing in the sun's spotlight. He'll watch his husband, his daughter, his dog, and their peaceful faces, and feel no dismay that he isn't with them, because here he can preserve them in this safe place and hold them there for a little longer.

* * *

_12th October 2034_

"Kobol?" Peter says.

All he gets in response is a pained whimper.

_Oh, God. Not now. Not yet. Surely not--_

Kobol's eyes are frighteningly dull. 

It's been creeping up on Peter for months, Kobol moving more and more slowly around the house, needing help up the stairs, starting to resist going for walks, but Peter hadn't wanted to admit it. Hadn't wanted to even entertain the thought.

Now, his dog, his beautiful dog, is unable to even get up from the floor, looking older than he ever has before. Looking like…

"Let's go to the vet. Okay? Let's fix you, baby.”

Peter doesn’t care that Kobol’s huge and heavy and ungainly. He cradles him in his arms as gently as he can and lifts him. 

“You're gonna be better real soon."

* * *

Of course, Peter was kidding himself.

* * *

The light in this small private vet’s room is low, almost respectfully so.

"We love you to bits, little guy," Ned is telling Kobol quietly and fervently, one hand resting on his coat with the gentle touch you might apply to broken china. MJ and Ella are in the corner of the room, looking at Peter, probably pitying him a lot. Peter lets them pity him. He needs some pity right now, he thinks.

They file out like it's already the damn funeral. But they all say goodbye to Kobol, who's laid out there on a metal table like they're gonna cut him open the moment he--

The point is, they all say goodbye and they all hug Peter and then they all give them their privacy. 

Peter put a blanket on the table so Kobol wouldn't get cold. He likes soft surfaces to burrow into. Even though he's probably not up for burrowing anymore.

Peter's thirty, but not right now. Right now, he's sixteen at best.

Rhodey and Pepper are next to pay their respects. They go straight to Peter, holding him up with their hugs. Peter thinks they forget, too, that he's not sixteen all over again and in need of soothing circles rubbed into his back to ease his anguish.

It's nice. It helps him breathe a little.

Tony is probably out in the corridor with Juliet and Harley. Juliet was crying at the state of Kobol, at how he'd barely turn his head into her hand when she scratched his ears, so Harley took her away for a moment. He could tell Peter isn't able to leave his dog's side right now.

"You've been a great friend to us all," Pepper says to Kobol, and Peter presses his thumbs into his eyes. He told himself he wouldn't cry until it--

Until it was actually happening--

But why did he think he'd actually be able to manage that?

Why does he expect that? Why should anyone? His dog is--

Rhodey leans close to Kobol's ear, the one that flopped over on his first birthday and still flops today. "I want you to know that I forgive you for eating my hamburger. It was my fault for leaving it out, and I know it was a really nice burger. I don't blame you."

Peter's smile catches the first of his tears. He tastes salt.

Then someone else is knocking on the door and Peter wonders who the hell else is joining the party--

"I'd recognise that dog anywhere. Kobol, isn't it? And Peter? Man, you've grown up."

Peter can't believe it. 

"Todd."

The man is still wearing a gilet. He's got a great deal more grey hairs.

"I'm so sorry if I'm intruding," he says.

"No. I called you. I just thought - I don't know, honestly. I thought it might be… nice."

Todd nods. 

He approaches the table but sits by Peter first, hovering his hand over his shoulder then retracting it. "I remember you didn't like to be touched."

"It's… it's actually alright now," Peter says honestly.

"Oh. That's great."

Then Todd turns to Kobol. He doesn't break out into any big speech. He just says, "Hey, buddy. I'd like to apologize once again for running you over. Although you probably don't even remember that anymore. You've probably made a life full of much more interesting memories with Peter, huh? You seem like a really good dog. And you got a good owner, too. I hope you got to do everything your little canine heart desired."

God, Peter hopes. He's never hoped so hard for a dog.

But suddenly, it really doesn't matter that Kobol's a dog. He's just a friend. A friend that went with Peter through life at its very best and very worst.

"Thank you, Todd," Peter tells him as he makes to leave, and he really means it.

"It's a pleasure, son."

Juliet and Harley and Tony sit with him for half an hour while Kobol slowly grows heavier against his blanket. The vet left them alone for these last few hours, now that there's nothing that can be done. 

They all stroke the dog gently, silently. Bear is tucked under Kobol's chin, always his favourite toy. She’s ragged with dirt and drool and teeth marks, but she’s still Bear.

Then comes a time when Harley and Tony seem to come to an understanding without saying a word. They get up at the same time.

"I think you should be with him at the end, Pete," Harley says to him. "I'll be outside with Juliet."

"You deserve to be with him too."

Tony cups the back of Peter's neck. "It's alright, kid. We've said goodbye. He's your Kobol."

Something about that remark rugs at the floodgates of Peter's heart. He sniffs against a sudden storm of grief.

“Hey,” Tony soothes, not making false promises that everything will be alright, just being there. He draws Peter into him for a moment. Peter breathes damply into the shoulder of his shirt. He never managed to get taller than Tony after all.

Pressing one last kiss to Kobol’s forehead, Tony follows the others out of the room.

It’s just Peter and Kobol. Just like it’s always been, really, at the heart of everything. Kobol and Peter.

“Oh, baby,” Peter says to his heavy stillness, “I’m sorry.”

Just slightly, Kobol nudges his head into Peter’s hand.

Peter lays his head right alongside his dog’s. “I wish you could understand how good you’ve been. You’ve been such a good boy.”

Kobol’s tail thumps once on the blanket. Peter crumples into a smile.

“Yeah. That’s right, baby boy. And you’re at the grand old age of fourteen now. Look at you. And I guess I’m glad that it’s going like this. That everyone’s had the chance to say goodbye. That you’re not in any pain or anything. But - I’m gonna tell you a secret, K… I want more than fourteen years with you.”

More life is leaking out of Kobol’s eyes right in front of Peter. It’s getting hard to bear. His throat is stopping up.

“I want more time, buddy. I want you forever. I don’t want you gone.”

A stream of moisture begins its path down Peter’s side-turned face. The truth is painful.

With some miraculous reserve of strength, Kobol begins to move. Peter starts to calm him, but then he sees what Kobol’s doing.

He’s nudging Bear towards Peter.

Even in his last moments, he’s trying to comfort him.

Peter takes the toy with a sob. “Thank you,” he says wetly.

Kobol relaxes.

Not caring anymore if it’s crazy, Peter climbs up on the table and curls around his dog, needing him to feel as comforted as Kobol has made him feel a million times in the past.

“I want you to know how much you mean to me. I honestly… I think you’ve saved my life a few times. You’ve been better than I ever could have asked. Thank you for that, baby. And I hope that I meant a lot to you too. I hope I was as good to you as you deserve.”

They’re approaching their last few moments. Kobol’s breath barely lifts his ribcage. He’s beginning to drift.

Peter is glad that it’s drifting. He thinks he’ll be able to accept drifting in time.

He tells Kobol a bedtime story.

“Do you remember the very first night you spent with me?” he says softly. “When I just started crying and crying? And you tried to paw the tears right off my face? I remember just… being so happy, but also feeling like I’d only just discovered something that I’d missed for a long time. I remember that you calmed me down, like you always do. And when I went to sleep, I had no nightmares. I slept through the night for the first time since Larry started to visit me four years ago. That was you, baby boy.”

Slowly, slowly, Kobol’s eyes begin to slide shut.

Peter doesn’t panic. He just says what he wants Kobol to know most of all.

“I love you, Kobol.”

He meets Kobol’s eyes, those soulful things that always flung out devotion like it would go stale if he didn’t hand it directly to his favourite people. They’re half-lidded but still hanging on to Peter’s gaze with infinite adoration.

Because Peter got to be Kobol’s favourite person of all. That’s a privilege he will never forget.

“You can let go,” he whispers to Kobol. “You can sleep now. It’s okay.”

And within the _it’s okay_ is _I’ll be alright._

Peter will be. It’ll take time, but he will be.

Kobol’s eyes close. He slackens fully into Peter’s arms. His chest rises and falls once more, then stills.

Peter kisses the crown of his head. It’s still warm.

He keeps holding Kobol until he’s ready to let him go.

_“Oh my God.”_

_And Peter’s knocked over by something he can’t explain yet, something too huge for him to handle alone, something that leaves him shuddering and weeping and like he’s just crossed the finish line of a marathon he’d forgotten he was running._

_He sits up in bed and buries his face in his hands, but he’s intercepted by an eager nose butting into his fingers, intercepting his rough touch._

_“Oh my God,” Peter says again, looking at the little puppy before him. Kobol’s head is cocked adorably to the side, like he’s trying his best to figure out what the hell is going on with Peter._

_At the time, Peter had no idea._

Now, he realises that what had so bowled him over was Kobol himself. A reminder that he was in the real world. A companion who would stick with him for years to come. A friend.

_His dog._

His dog.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> well.  
> i mean it's the story of kobol's whole life so what did you expect it makes sense to have the end be like The End--  
> but yeah,,,, i'm sorry,,,  
> if it's consolation this was also painful for me, i did cry a bit editing the final scene  
> (but i've been planning that death scene for months HOLY MOLEY)
> 
> You might have noticed that a lot of details, characters and events have been introduced in this work but not fully explained. Peter's lasting love bite; what happened in sex ed class; Peter's general high school experience; how he was with MJ then ended up with Harley; Harley's eating disorder; how Peter knows how to box; Peter and Harley's married life; Juliet and how she came to be their daughter! These will be explained in a range of upcoming works, so if you're interested, watch this space - or, more accurately, subscribe to this series! - to catch the next installments in the Room Where It Happens universe!  
> The next work I plan to post is already prewritten. All I will reveal about it is the title:  
> A FILM BY HARLEY KEENER  
> I hope y'all are excited!!!
> 
> In the meantime,,,, i apologise again?? and i'm also so thankful to everyone who read, commented on and kudos-ed this fic! i appreciate every one of you!!! you make my life sparkly folks :)


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